Fox News criticizes Dr. Mehmet Oz in on-air segment

"Dr. Oz thought he could get away with it."

That line is the caption NowThis Impact put on its YouTube video "Fox News Calls Out Oz," posted October 6, 2026.

The upload turns on a live exchange from the night before. On October 5, 2026, Dr. Mehmet Oz, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, appeared on Fox News’s The Ingraham Angle. Host Laura Ingraham opened on price clarity. “We should know what things cost, okay? We wanna know what we’re paying. What the heck is going on, and how can you guys tackle this?” she said on air, as outlets covering the broadcast reported the exchange.

Oz answered with props. “Well, at healthcare, we write the prices in invisible ink. So, you have no idea what things are gonna cost. I brought you something as an example. We went grocery shopping — stick of butter, bag of peanuts. Butter in America, it’s about a buck for a stick like this. If I charge you 10 dollars—” he said. Ingraham cut in. “Where are you shopping? It’s not a buck. It’s like four.”

Oz laughed on the set. “Well, I just bought this, so it’s close to that. Maybe it’s going bad.” Ingraham shot back, “Okay, a Mamdani store you bought it at.” The jab pointed at New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s plan for five city-owned grocery stores by 2029 selling goods at prices 30 percent below retail. Oz pressed on. “Exactly. So, you buy the stick of butter, and you buy it for the right price. In healthcare, we’re not doing this. This stick of butter could cost anything. You have no idea until after you’ve already made the purchase.”

Acyn posted a clip of the back-and-forth to X that same night. Reporting on the segment identified the butter Oz held as a Trader Joe’s product. The company’s website lists it at $4.99. President Donald Trump appointed Oz to lead CMS in 2025; the Senate confirmed him along party lines. Oz lost the 2022 Pennsylvania Senate race to John Fetterman. In June 2014 he testified before a Senate consumer protection panel chaired by Claire McCaskill over weight-loss supplement claims he had made on television.

X users called Oz out of touch. Some said he had not been inside a grocery store. Others noted that retail chains do not sell single sticks of butter for a dollar. Former American Heart Association chairman Craig Beam put a public dare on the record. “I want to challenge Dr. Oz. I will fly out on my own dime to D.C. and we can go to every grocery store he chooses, but at least 20 and we’ll stop when he finds butter for $1 lb. I’ll arrange a video crew to film it all,” Beam said, according to The New Republic’s write-up of the fallout.