Newsmax clashed with the Republican National Committee over co-sponsoring a GOP presidential primary debate.

Axios reported that the RNC offered Newsmax as the junior partner to ABC News for the third debate after Fox News and Fox Business hosted the first two.

Nonetheless, executives hesitated to be a junior partner with a mainstream media outlet and thought the $2 million the RNC required the network to spend on the event was extreme. Eventually, that debate resulted in NBC News and Salem Media Group working together on the third debate.

Moreover, Newsmax was approached again to host the Republican debate. The RNC came to Newsmax to be the primary sponsor for the fourth GOP debate, which will take place in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on Wednesday that ultimately went to NewsNation.

Still, the economics might have been an issue, as Newsmax would have had to spend approximately $4 million to produce the debate if they hosted it.

When the RNC announced that NewsNation would sponsor the fourth debate, it left the executives at Newsmax fuming as they were still searching for an additional sponsor to split the costs.

Axios obtained an email showing that executives from the conservative cable outlet were aware that the costs would vary based on the nature of the sponsors’ partnership, despite their belief that the RNC had changed the terms of their agreement.

Former President Donald Trump will again skip the Republican debate, which NewsNation is hosting next week. However, he will still be on television, just in another capacity.

According to Deadline, Trump will participate in a Fox News town hall on Tuesday, one night before the next Republican debate. The event will be in Davenport, IA, at 9 p.m. ET.

Furthermore, Sean Hannity, who is coming off moderating the debate between California Governor Gavin Newsom and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, will be hosting the pre-taped event.

Meanwhile, the other Republican candidates will be at the Frank Moody Music Building in Tuscaloosa, AL, for the debate, with Elizabeth Vargas, Megyn Kelly, and Eliana Johnson serving as moderators.

Nikki Haley, DeSantis, and Vivek Ramaswamy are expected to participate in the event, but it remains uncertain whether Chris Christie will meet the qualifications to attend.

NewsNation hosts Chris Cuomo and Dan Abrams got into a spar on Thursday. The reason for the sparring was due to Mediaite, a website that Abrams owns, for factually reporting on his own words.

Chris Cuomo stated he’d consider voting for former President Donald Trump because he’s open to voting for anyone. However, he had an issue with Mediaite leaving out key context for his remarks.

“Your outlet, and a lot of other ones, did what you often criticize, which is they didn’t contact me,” Cuomo told Abrams. “They didn’t want context.”

Abrams quickly pushed back, saying that Mediaite did not need to contact him over his comments.

“Wait, why do they need to contact you?” Abrams said. “What is there to contact you about? You said what you said in the interview. It speaks for itself. What do they have to contact you about?”

Cuomo then responded, telling Abrams that any credible reporter would be asking follow-up questions to ensure they had context for the comments.

“When you are going to cover what somebody said, you call if you’re a responsible reporter and say, ‘Hey, did you say this? And what did you mean when you said this?’” Cuomo added. 

Again, Abrams defended Mediaite and stated that they did not need to offer follow-up questions to Cuomo’s remarks. 

“What do you mean, ‘Did you do this?’ You’re not denying you said it,” Abrams told Cuomo. “You don’t call when someone makes a comment on their show. You don’t have to say, ‘Did you say it?’ You know they said it.”