Wonder what it was like in the room when the producers decided they had to put “This segment is made possible by our sponsor: Ark Encounter” at the bottom. Was it a contentious fight between the brass and some conscientious objectors who put their feet down and said “Alright, this payola has gone too far for too long. Enough is enough. Either we disclose the Ark Encounter sponsorship on-screen or you find another fucking live broadcast engineering team at 5:35 AM on a Tuesday”?

Maybe that’s a stretch but equally hard to imagine is that there wasn’t at least some level of angst that led Fox to invoke that imprimatur of journalistic ethics, that finally somewhere there’s a line for them after decades of crossing so many of the others that still exist at real news organizations.

Then again what’s one more line? Plus they run a shit ton of other payola without disclosure. Hell if anything maybe this one being so blatant as to force the sponsorship functions as an effective limited hangout, that if they were “honest” about this one then other, marginally more subtle, undisclosed advertorials would appear as sincere enthusiasm and/or normal “buzz” coverage.

After that segment it was back to regularly scheduled propaganda from the network…

"It's just the Democrats trying to stop the president's momentum": @SecScottBessent expresses confidence that the Senate will pass the “big, beautiful bill” today pic.twitter.com/hqo6DURvsE

— FOX & Friends (@foxandfriends) July 1, 2025

Funny story about the whole Treasury Suckretary Scott Bessent trying to blame “the Democrats” for the Senate GOP still being all jammed up: Republicans have a three-vote majority in the chamber and could pass the bill if they got 50 of their members to agree on the legislative package.