When Donald J. Trump first starred on The Apprentice, over twenty years ago, the show was a surprise hit. The creative team managed to make its narcissistic, petty and cruel host likable.

The show’s creator, Mark Burnett, also made viewers forget that Donald J. Trump was the same man who had a slew of business failures throughout his career including six bankruptcies involving failed casinos and the Plaza Hotel.

Although The Apprentice managed to garner huge ratings when it first debuted it lost about 60% of its audience within two years. The creative team tried to revive the series by creating The Celebrity Apprentice which briefly gave it a boost that quickly dwindled.

Eventually things got so bad that producers cobbled together The Celebrity Apprentice All Stars where they brought back popular celebrity contestants in the hopes, they could revive the glory days of the first few seasons. It didn’t work.

Reality television is much cheaper to produce than other types of traditional programming which is one reason NBC may have kept the show running as long as it did.

Much like the final seasons of his reality show Trump seems to be in the death throes of his MAGA glory days. The ratings for Fox News, his personal propaganda network, have also taken a hit.

Although Fox News still dominates cable news its ratings are down 28% since the same time last year. In the past decade no other network besides Fox News has seen this big of a decline the month before the midterm elections.

Fox News is especially doing poorly with the demographic most coveted by advertisers viewers aged 25-54.

At this point it appears obvious that Fox News is trying to figure out a way to untangle itself from the MAGA cult without losing even more viewers.

The network almost seems to be holding its breath and bracing itself for what will likely be a disastrous outcome for the Republican Party in the midterm elections.

Months ago, I decided to go through all 117 Trump campaign rallies from 2023-2024. Each event is about 90 minutes long, so it’s been quite an undertaking. I’ve only gotten through 72.

I wanted to see patterns in how he spun his exaggerations and lies to send his followers down the MAGA rabbit hole. Although Trump is a natural salesman in many ways, he’s had so many business failures that it’s astounding that he was able to transfix about one-third of this country.

After failing to sell steaks, bottled water, vodka, supplements, mortgages, cologne, shuttle flights, a board game and a gambling experience at luxurious casinos Trump finally found his magical elixir for the masses - xenophobia.

The hatred of immigrants, foreigners or anyone who is seen as different was the ultimate Trump product.

Just as fascist leaders have scapegoated marginal groups in the past Donald J. Trump took aim at the most vulnerable.

He created a mythology that included world leaders purposefully trafficking hardened criminals past our borders to sow chaos and unrest.

Every social ill in the United States was caused by immigrants - high housing costs, unemployment, violent crime and the disintegration of what Trump called the American dream.

The only solution was to seal off the border, expel the outsiders and attack trade partners with punitive tariffs. Transgender folks were also thrown on the pyre of hatred.

As more Americans are souring on Trump Fox News is falling back on his old tactics. In the last few weeks before the midterm elections the network has ramped up hatred and fear towards Somali Americans and Muslims.

Xenophobia is old hat for Fox News. The network has enthusiastically trashed and smeared immigrants for years.

As Trump travels across the country to give speeches in mostly deeply red states his propaganda machine is running out of ideas.

The network has tried every way possible to lift the president’s sagging poll numbers and boost Republican candidates in the midterm elections.

It’s not working. Most polls continue to favor Democrats even in races that Republicans would have won easily four years ago.

Since there is no imposing migrant caravan headed towards the southern border Fox News had to get creative.

The network shifted its focus to Europe. Fox News hosts declared that student protests in France were a sign of future riots in the United States.

Fox News also told its viewers that the controversial arrest of a teenager over hate speech laws in the U.K. could lead to the erosion of the First Amendment.

None of this made any sense but the network needed to whip up its viewers into a frenzy of xenophobic and racial hatred without alienating Black and Latino voters who might vote for Republicans.

Fox News went back to an old target - Muslim Americans. Jesse Watters implied that their culture and religion were fundamentally un-American.

The network also scapegoated the Somali American community, which also happens to be mostly Muslim, as the primary source of the decay and rot in suburban Midwestern America.

The Black and Latino population in the United States is significantly larger than the Muslim community which only makes up about 1% of the total U.S. population. There is a significant Muslim population in Texas though so Fox News risks alienating folks in what could be a razor thin election for the U.S. Senate in that state.

I have no doubt the day after the midterm elections that Fox News will go right back to focusing on urban crime and immigrants from Central and South America.