“Objective” Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner made her priorities very clear when she allowed Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh to smear Fox News pollsters as a “Democrat polling firm” with only the weakest of a weak-tea “defense” of her own network.

Murtaugh appeared on Faulkner’s Outnumbered Overtime yesterday. Fox describes the show as “utilizing the resources of FNC journalists in the field, plus one-on-one interviews with newsmakers and roundtable discussions with the network's top contributors.” In other words, it’s not supposed to be a propaganda arm of the Trump campaign or anyone else.

But clearly, Faulkner’s loyalty lay more with Team Trump than with Team Fox or Team Truth.

MURTAUGH: I like you, Harris, but no offense, the Fox News poll is always one of the worst and it’s notoriously bad. Your main pollster is always working for failed Democrat candidates and was, in fact, Tom Steyer’s pollster. And you got one college professor in there, so you call it bipartisan. But it’s a Democrat polling firm and it’s a big one. And so we have always discounted Fox News’ polls.

FACT CHECK: Fox News polling is highly respected. Who hires the pollster has no bearing on the quality of their work.

But Faulkner said nothing.

Murtaugh continued:

MURTAUGH: What you see in a lot of state polls, from different organizations, are a definite narrowing of the race and the president actually taking leads in a lot of the key states: Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona. Polls in recent days showing the president pulling ahead in those states and it’s what we’ve always seen in ours.

FACT CHECK: Most recent Florida polls and recent Arizona polls have Biden winning. The recent polls are unanimous in Biden’s favor for North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

Again, Faulkner made no challenge.

Next, Murtaugh dubiously claimed the campaign is no longer looking at polls but only “actual votes now.”

Faulkner’s response? “Mmmm,” said as though she found this a fascinating strategy for victory.

Murtaugh went on to claim that the campaign can see from the early voting data that despite a big Democratic lead in early voters, “every single day that has passed, the president has chipped away at that lead.” He claimed, without offering any evidence – or being asked for any – that “Joe Biden has not gotten enough votes in the bank to overcome the gigantic wave of support that’s going to come from President Trump’s voters actually on Election Day.”

Murtaugh also claimed dubiously, at best, that Biden’s lead is “virtually gone” in most states.

Faulkner’s next question is what passes for a reality check from this “straight news” anchor.

FAULKNER: Anything surprising you down the stretch at all? I mean, Pennsylvania we knew would be tight. We knew fracking would be an issue. Things tightening there but Biden still in the lead and I’m not pointing just to our polls.

And here’s her “defense” of her network:

FAULKNER: By the way, both sides, both campaigns are not thrilled with Fox News polling, so maybe we’re doing something right. I don’t know. But anyway, go ahead.

MURTAUGH: No, I wouldn’t go that far.

You can watch Faulkner display her uber-allegiance to Trump below, from the November 1, 2020 Outnumbered Overtime, via CNN’s Oliver Darcy.

(H/T Richard W.)