Texas Prisons Force Women Survivors to Consume Fox News Spin on Epstein Files

Inside Texas prisons, where nearly 150,000 people are held and up to 95% of incarcerated women have endured domestic or sexual violence, access to news is not a matter of choice or curiosity. Instead, it is a calculated policy decision that funnels survivors into a narrow, ideologically driven media diet. For many women locked up in higher security levels, Fox News is the only channel they are allowed to watch during their one hour of daily television.

This is no accident. Fox News, a network built by Roger Ailes—a man who ran a notorious sexual harassment operation—is the same outlet that has shielded and amplified Donald Trump, a man named repeatedly in the Epstein files as connected to prolific child sex trafficking. The network’s coverage of Epstein routinely downplays Trump’s involvement and protects powerful men while shaping which victims are deemed credible.

The prison’s forced consumption of Fox News is a policy instrument, not neutral information. It controls what survivors understand about their own abuse and the systemic violence that put them behind bars. At lower security levels, incarcerated people can vote on channels, but this semblance of choice vanishes as security classifications rise. Those in restrictive housing and mental health programs—who can make up half the prison population—have no say and receive Fox News exclusively.

Beyond television, the information control extends to radios and tablets. Radios broadcast content from American Family Radio and Focus on the Family, both known for extreme anti-LGBTQIA+ and anti-reproductive rights agendas. Tablets offer free content from conservative and evangelical sources promoting white Christian nationalism, conversion therapy, and opposition to gender-affirming care.

This ideological curation means that the poorest, most isolated incarcerated people—those without financial support to buy tablets—are left with the most restrictive and harmful media diet. Meanwhile, Texas forces incarcerated people to work without pay, deepening the exploitation.

The state’s media control inside prisons is a political architecture designed to maintain power structures, suppress survivor voices, and distort public understanding of abuse and accountability. The screen shared by incarcerated women is not a window to truth but a wall of misinformation, protecting the powerful and silencing those who need justice most.