Last month, Megyn Kelly featured an interview with Jake Tapper that — at times — was contentious. She later called the situation awkward. However, radio hosts like Michael Berry, Chris Stigall, and Mike Gallagher have been in similar situations in their careers.
Tapper has a new book out that takes a behind-the-scenes look at former President Joe Biden dropping out of the 2024 presidential race. It majorly questions his mental acuity and fitness for office. That led Kelly to ask tough questions of the CNN host, which went viral.
In the aftermath, Kelly said that it was an awkward conversation because she and Tapper are friendly, more so than friends, but that he had asked her to be tough but fair in the interview.
Having those difficult conversations is the hallmark of a great radio host. So, we reached out to three nationally syndicated radio hosts to gauge how they would have handled a similar situation.
Each had said they had had an interview go haywire at some point in their careers.
“I interviewed former Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) after the 2020 election,” said Chris Stigall, morning host for Salem Radio Network, said. “He knew exactly where I was going to take the questions as I shared it with his team in advance. He had a standing weekly appointment with me. We’d differed on things like guns or social issues in the past, but conversations always ended amicably. But when I pressed him on the integrity of the 2020 election, he refused to so much as question the integrity and legitimacy of it. I can’t fill a hand with the number of times I’ve ended an interview in pure anger, but that was one.”
“I got into it with Michael Smerconish, of all people,” Mike Gallagher, midday host for Salem Radio Network, said. “It was the strangest interview. This was years ago. I assumed that Smerconish was a conservative radio host out of Philly. In the course of the interview, I find out he voted for Obama. And of course, all kinds of alarms are going off. As I remember, he hung up on me in the middle of the interview. It was just contentious to that degree. I mean, it wasn’t a shouting or anything. But it got ugly, and he got mad. I didn’t really plan on creating a rift with him like that. I don’t really have anything against him, but I just remember feeling how weird that was, so that went south.”
“I did have a very contentious conversation on air with Arlen Specter years ago, the then senator from Pennsylvania had just switched parties, from being a Republican to a Democrat,” Michael Berry, morning host on 740 KTRH and evening host with Premiere Networks, said. “He had done a town hall meeting in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, and he was just thrashed by the audience, and he announced that he didn’t have to be there with them. As if he was doing them some big favor by coming to one of the towns in the state he’s supposed to represent in the Senate. He was trying to repair his image. And he came on my show, and I absolutely let him have it. Just let him have it.
“There was another occasion where I had T. Boone Pickens on the air, and he was trying to influence a presidential election with these spots about windmills, which I thought were completely stupid and self serving, since he was heavily invested in it. Both of those occasions, I came into the interview loaded for bear. That’s not a very common thing for me to do, and I haven’t done it in some number of years.”
Michael Berry added that he believes there’s a time and a place to feature such a sharp interview style. However, he agreed with the strategy that Megyn Kelly took with Jake Tapper ahead of their conversation.
“I think it’s only fair when someone comes on the air who you are prepared to hit very hard, that you tell them that. If I’m going to interview someone or have a conversation with someone that I don’t like what they’re pitching, we’re very clear with them ahead of time,” said Berry. “I don’t do very many softball interviews of someone promoting a book or a movie or whatever, because I don’t think that serves the listener. And my standard is, does the listener gain from this? So if they’re coming on and I intend to ask them tough questions, I’m very clear about that. I think that’s the only fair way to do it. You should disclose that I don’t like when I sense that someone was lured into a friendly conversation and then the person jumps off.”
He pointed to the famous interview between Jon Stewart and Jim Cramer on The Daily Show during The Great Recession was a bit of a case in point for what he believes is enjoyable content from a schadenfreude standpoint, but isn’t something he himself would ever do.
Mike Gallagher said he often turns down authors and politicians for interview opportunities because, like Michael Berry, he doesn’t believe the audience gains much from those conversations.
“I like the show to be caller-driven,” said Gallagher, rather than rely on interviews. “I figure, if it’s the same interview that everybody else is going to do, why do it? I’d rather have a unique caller from Paducah, Kentucky, than a congressman. So I don’t have that much of a body of work of tons of interviews. It’s not an interview show. And I’ve never really done an interview show.”
Chris Stigall joked that his most contentious interview with Pat Toomey should be highlighted that both he and President Trump still have their jobs, while “I don’t know what Pat’s up to” after he failed to run for re-election in the 2022 race.
He added that he admires the ability of Megyn Kelly to be upfront and honest with her guests that she’s going to be a difficult interviewer.
“That’s what makes Megyn great,” said Stigall. “And most honest brokers. They don’t hide who they are in interviews and ambush their guests. They invite them in to defend and debate their position.”
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Garrett Searight is Barrett Media’s News Editor, which includes writing daily news stories, features, and opinion columns. He joined Barrett Media in 2022 after a decade leading several radio brands in several formats, as well as a 5-year stint working in local television. In addition to his work with Barrett Media, he is a radio and TV play-by-play broadcaster. Reach out to him at Garrett@BarrettMedia.com.
