Following former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s announcement that he’ll be leaving Fox News to continue considering a 2016 bid for the White House, a source tells the Washington Examiner media desk that another personality at the cable news channel may soon follow suit.
“John Bolton may be next,” said the source, who works at Fox News but spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about internal personnel issues.
The source said it will not be a surprise to Bolton should Fox decide to part ways with the former United Nations ambassador. “He just wants to stay at Fox as long as possible,” the source said.
Bolton, who served at the U.N. under former President George W. Bush, has not declared officially whether he will seek the Republican nomination for president. He told the Daily Caller in November, however, that he was considering it, especially if former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared her candidacy for the Democratic nomination.
“Her principle ‘qualification’ is her time as secretary of state. So, being able to dissect and explain to the voters why she fails as a leader, I think is going to be critical for whomever is interested in the Republican nomination,” Bolton said at the time.
He also said there is a “threat of isolationism” within the GOP that is “of very much concern” to him. He declined to state whether he was referring to Sen. Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican who espouses a non-interventionist approach to foreign policy matters.
Bolton told the Daily Caller he had no “time table” on when officially to declare his own candidacy should he decide to run.
Huckabee, who ran for president in 2008 and won the Iowa caucus, announced on his own popular Fox News show Saturday that he was ending the program to continue mulling a second bid for the White House. He hosted the show for more than six years.
On his final show, Huckabee suggested that the decision to end his program was initiated by executives at Fox. “There’s been a great deal of speculation as to whether I would run for president and if I were willing to absolutely rule that out, I could keep doing this show. But I can’t make such a declaration,” Huckabee said. He added, “I agree with Fox that this is the right thing and now is the right time.”
The source at Fox confirmed as much to the Examiner, saying “[Huckabee] was flirting too much with running for president, so he was forced out.”
Fox has faced similar situations with its roster of on-air talent in the past, including with former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (who now works at CNN), and former Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown, all Republicans. Brown has since returned as a contributor following his unsuccessful New Hampshire senatorial bid.
A Fox News spokesperson did not respond to an Examiner request for comment.
