Reporter blows lid off Fox-Trump partnership: 'They make money by enraging Americans'

Reporter Jane Mayer came out Monday with a bombshell article probing the symbiotic relationship between President Donald Trump and Fox News -- and she said their shared business model is undermining U.S. democracy.

The New Yorker investigative journalist appeared on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" to discuss the article, and she said her reporting found the relationship between the president and his favorite channel was even closer than it appeared.

"What Fox does is it makes money by enraging Americans, that's how they keep them glued to the television set," Mayer said. "It's very much the same model that Trump has to keep his base engaged. So you've got a rage-based model for both of them, and what it's doing is it's spinning the country in an increasingly inflamed direction, and so it has a huge effect on our national politics."

Mayer said the president and Fox News worked together to amplify their messages.

"It carries his message and it also gives him a message a lot of the time," she said. "Trump picks up on what he sees on Fox, and I've got quotes from people who are very close in to the White House, people who worked in the White House, in and out of Fox, saying what you've got is a dysfunctional White House all of the time with no normal decision-making process, where a lot of the policy-making is the president picking up what's on Fox."

"Then I describe how Fox puts on what it does on the news, which is shocking in many ways," Mayer added. "I mean, taking stuff straight off of the most crackpot blogs. Don't take it me, take it from the people who are quoted from Fox saying so."