GREENVALE, N.Y. (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump stated Thursday night time in accepting the “Patriot of the Yr” award at Fox Nation’s Patriot Awards that he has already achieved extra since his election victory than President Joe Biden has in his whole time period.
Trump, who has been largely ensconced at Mar-a-Lago in current weeks as he’s been announcing job picks for his administration, traveled to New York’s Lengthy Island for the annual awards ceremony from the Fox News streaming platform.
“I believe you’ve gotten seen extra occur within the final two weeks than you’ve gotten within the final 4 years,” Trump informed the gang on the Tilles Heart for the Performing Arts.
“It was an incredible day, an incredible night time,” he stated of his election victory in a 10-minute acceptance speech that seemed like a spotlight reel of his marketing campaign rally speeches, full with a stay efficiency of “God Bless the USA” by the singer Lee Greenwood, calls to “get the criminals out of our nation” and an embrace of all-paper election ballots and necessary voter ID.
Trump additionally famous the conversations he’s had with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum since he threatened two of the nation’s prime buying and selling companions with a 25% tariff on all imported items until they do extra to sort out unlawful border crossings and drug flows.
“Justin got here flying proper in,” Trump stated in reference to Trudeau’s journey to Mar-a-Lago. That prompted some within the viewers to chant “51!” — a reference to Trump apparently joking at his dinner with Trudeau that Canada might turn out to be the 51st U.S. state.
The annual awards “honor and acknowledge America’s most interesting patriots, together with navy veterans, first responders and different inspirational on a regular basis heroes,” in accordance with Fox. The occasion was hosted by Fox host Sean Hannity, a good friend of Trump’s who stepped in after the president-elect nominated Pete Hegseth, the unique host, as protection secretary.
Amongst these acknowledged Thursday night time had been conservative actor and evangelist Kirk Cameron; Gen. Dick Cody, who used his personal helicopter to ship provides to folks after Hurricane Helene; and Jonathan Diller, the New York Police Department officer who was killed during a traffic stop in Queens. His widow, Stephanie, obtained a standing ovation and thanked Trump for his help. Others invoked Trump as nicely.
The ceremony additionally honored Paws of Warfare, a corporation that gives service canine to veterans and helps these serving abroad deliver animals they meet in battle zones to the U.S. One such reunion happened onstage, as a service member was reunited with a canine he’d cared for whereas deployed.
The heartfelt moments had been juxtaposed in opposition to the boisterous and incendiary political fare that loyal watchers of Fox hosts like Hannity count on.
The anchor used his introduction to take an election victory lap, boasting that Democrats “received their ass kicked.” He performed “YMCA” — the tune Trump has lengthy used to shut out his rallies — and invited viewers members to bounce just like the president-elect. And he supplied a collection of impressions, mimicking former vice presidential candidate Tim Walz’s enthusiasm and Biden showing misplaced, full with a backdrop of the rainforest the place he spoke throughout a current journey to the Amazon.
Later, he donned an orange security vest — a nod to the one Trump wore when he delivered a press conference from a garbage truck throughout the marketing campaign after Biden suggested Trump’s supporters were garbage.
The present was initially set to be hosted by Hegseth, who left his place at Fox when Trump tapped him to run the Pentagon — a nomination that’s currently in jeopardy over allegations of sexual assault and extreme ingesting, which Hegseth denies.
Members of the viewers cheered when Hegseth appeared in a video that was performed to showcase the tales of Division of Veterans Affairs whistleblowers. Fox personalities Rachel Campos-Duffy and Will Cain stated after the looks that Hegseth would “make one hell of” a secretary of protection.
Trump’s award additionally marks the end result of Fox’s reembrace of the president-elect, who has had an up-and-down relationship with the community lately.
Fox paid $787 million in 2023 to settle a defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Methods over false claims by Fox personalities who echoed Trump’s lies that the 2020 election was stolen from him by mass voter fraud. For greater than six months ending in spring 2023, Fox had what many thought-about a “delicate ban” on Trump appearances, with its leaders trying to transfer on. However when it grew to become clear that voters didn’t need to, Fox and its personalities had been fast to embrace Trump once more.
Particular person personalities have undergone their very own journeys: Former Fox host Megyn Kelly drew Trump’s ire in a 2015 debate for her sharp query about his therapy of girls; now she’s a popular podcast host and Trump supporter. The Dominion lawsuit uncovered emails wherein former Fox host Tucker Carlson spoke disparagingly of Trump, together with saying he “actually can’t wait” for Trump to turn out to be an ex-president. They’ve since made amends.
Via all of it, Trump has been fast to take to social media to criticize Fox for content material he deems insufficiently loyal.
On Thursday, he was extra magnanimous.
“You’ve gotten unimaginable folks at Fox,” he stated earlier than quipping, “A pair I don’t like.”
Trump has begun to emerge extra in public since spending most of his transition to this point behind closed doors at his membership in Palm Seashore, Florida. This week, he made an unannounced look at a memorial service for 3 Palm Seashore County Sheriff’s Workplace deputies who had been killed in a automobile crash final month.
This weekend, he’ll travel to Paris to hitch different world leaders and dignitaries for a ceremony to have a good time the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral, which was devastated by a fireplace 5 years in the past.
AP Media Author David Bauder contributed to this report.
