After another war of words between Donald Trump and Fox News, the Trump campaign has announced he will not participate in the Fox News debate Thursday night. We've got his unbelievably obnoxious campaign statement, plus Megyn Kelly's response and more after the jump.

First, the war of words. I posted earlier today that Trump was going after Kelly and Fox again. Today, Trump put out an Instagram attacking Kelly and Fox put out two statements in response. From The New York Times:

But what seemed to really draw the ire of Mr. Trump was two statements put out by the network Tuesday morning. In one, Roger Ailes, the chairman and chief executive of Fox News, personally weighed in, saying in a statement that “Megyn Kelly is an excellent journalist and the entire network stands behind her — she will absolutely be on the debate stage on Thursday night.”

A statement from the network was even harsher, invoking President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Iran’s supreme leader: “We learned from a secret back channel that the Ayatollah and Putin both intend to treat Donald Trump unfairly when they meet with him if he becomes president — a nefarious source tells us that Trump has his own secret plan to replace the Cabinet with his Twitter followers to see if he should even go to those meetings.”

Trump's response - that he's going to quit the debate - sounded, as Eric Boehlert tweeted, as though it could have been written by the GOP's top quitter, Sarah Palin. It reads, in part:

Unlike the very stupid, highly incompetent people running our country into the ground, Mr. Trump knows when to walk away. Roger Ailes and FOX News think they can toy with him, but Mr. Trump doesn’t play games. There have already been six debates, and according to all online debate polls including Drudge, Slate, Time Magazine, and many others, Mr. Trump has won all of them, in particular the last one. Whereas he has always been a job creator and not a debater, he nevertheless truly enjoys the debating process - and it has been very good for him, both in polls and popularity. 

He will not be participating in the FOX News debate and will instead host an event in Iowa to raise money for the Veterans and Wounded Warriors, who have been treated so horribly by our all talk, no action politicians. Like running for office as an extremely successful person, this takes guts and it is the kind of mentality our country needs in order to Make America Great Again.

Tonight, on The Kelly File, Megyn Kelly responded:

KELLY: What's interesting is here is Trump is not used to not controlling things as the chief executive of a large organization. But the truth is, he doesn't get to control the media and while he's made his position clear about me after that first debate, Roger Ailes made his position clear too. And you know when Trump started it up again this past Saturday and then resumed it again and again and again and again, he was told repeatedly our debate team is settled and then came that Instagram video he put out today, followed by the company's statements.

 But wait, there's more. Fox said that Trump's campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, has threatened Kelly:

In a call on Saturday with a Fox News executive, Lewandowski stated that Megyn had a ‘rough couple of days after that last debate’ and he ‘would hate to have her go through that again.’ Lewandowski was warned not to level any more threats, but he continued to do so. We can’t give in to terrorizations toward any of our employees. Trump is still welcome at Thursday night’s debate and will be treated fairly, just as he has been during his 132 appearances on Fox News & Fox Business, but he can’t dictate the moderators or the questions.

Fox also said, "Trump is still welcome at Thursday night’s debate and will be treated fairly, just as he has been during his 132 appearances on Fox News & Fox Business, but he can’t dictate the moderators or the questions.”

Stay tuned!

Watch Kelly discuss Trump's decision below, from the January 26 The Kelly File, via Media Matters.

Caricature of Donald Trump by DonkeyHotey.