Fox News' Chris Wallace tells Stephen Colbert nobody's buying the GOP's pre-existing conditions line

Chris Wallace argues with Stephen Colbert

(Image credit: Screenshot/YouTube/The Late Show)

last updated 2 November 2018

Stephen Colbert welcomed Fox News anchor Chris Wallace on Thursday's Late Show, and they began their good-natured sparring on the upcoming midterms. Wallace said there have been big midterm elections before, like the 2010 and 1994 GOP waves, where health care was a huge topic. "And this time, strangely," Colbert said, lots of Republicans are "running on the fact that they'll save your health care, that they'll save your being covered by pre-existing conditions — when just seconds ago, they were doing everything they could to strip all of that out of the law. Are people believing that?"

"No," Wallace said, laughing, and "it is a problem for Republicans, because they ran on 'repeal and replace'" and "particularly weaken the pre-existing condition factor, and so Republicans are getting their tails whipped on that subject. And as a result, they're trying to change the subject, and that's why you see the president talking so much about immigration and the caravan about to invade America." "About to?" Colbert laughed. "They're careening toward us at foot speed."

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Wallace has a little media criticism. "I do think that the press has made a mistake, in some cases, in taking the president's bait and overreacting to it, and sometimes playing his game," he said. "We are not in his game. We shouldn't fight fire with fire. His job is to be a disrupter — and you call him whatever you want to call him — our job is to be reporters." They argued over the appropriateness of a Washington Post headline, and Wallace had to eat a bit of crow. You can watch that below. Peter Weber

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.