Chris Wallace: 'Im Just Sad With The Way Last Night Turned Out'

No, Chris Wallace isn’t happy with how Tuesday’s presidential debate went down either.

“I’m just sad with the way last night turned out,” the Fox News Sunday host told The New York Times on Wednesday. “I never dreamt that it would go off the tracks the way it did.”

Wallace’s mournful response is understated compared to those of observers like CNN ’s Jake Tapper , who described the debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden as “a hot mess, inside a dumpster fire, inside a train wreck.”

Still, Wallace admits that he should have realized sooner that Trump was going to run roughshod over the previously agreed-on rules to the debate.

“I guess I didn’t realize — and there was no way you could, hindsight being 20/20 — that this was going to be the president’s strategy, not just for the beginning of the debate but the entire debate,” he said.

At one point, Wallace called the debate to a temporary halt and told the Times it was for one reason only: “desperation.”

But Wallace refused to blame the whole miserable experience exclusively on Trump, though he admitted the president “certainly didn’t help.”

Wallace didn’t want to elaborate on that point. “To quote the president, ‘It is what it is,’” he said.

In the aftermath of what many called the worst presidential debate in American history, Wallace said he’s done a certain amount of soul-searching.

“Generally speaking, I did as well as I could, so I don’t have any second thoughts there,” Wallace said. “I’m just disappointed with the results. For me, but much more importantly, I’m disappointed for the country, because it could have been a much more useful evening than it turned out to be.”

Read more at The New York Times .