FRONTLINE

(crowd cheering) >> The biggest event to date in Campaign 2016... >> Top ten candidates taking the stage... >> Donald Trump gearing up for the crucial first G.O.P. presidential debate... >> Businessman Donald Trump. >> I had my research assistant research all the candidates who were going to be on stage that night... (on

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It is 9 p.m. on the east coast, and the moment of truth has arrived. (voiceover): And pull anything interesting or controversial about them, right? Everybody had a binder like this, and Trump had a binder like this. (laughs): Right? >>

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At the time, Megyn Kelly was a star on Fox News. >> Mr. Trump. One of the things people love about you is, you speak your mind and you don't use a politician's filter. However, that is not without its downsides. In particular, when it comes to women. You've called women you don't like "fat pigs," "dogs," "slobs," and "disgusting animals." Your Twitter account... >> Only Rosie O'Donnell. (audience laughing) >> No, it wasn't. (voiceover): He knew I was going to hit him on something, and he guessed it would be women, and he got some line worked up. Your Twitter account... (voiceover): Fine, we forged forward. The-- the convention center was laughing. But I was going to get through the rest of my question. For the record, it was well beyond Rosie O'Donnell. >> Yes, I'm sure it was. >> Your Twitter account has several disparaging comments about women's looks. You once told a contestant on "Celebrity Apprentice" it would be a pretty picture to see her on her knees. Does that sound to you like the temperament of a man we should elect as president? >> What I say is what I say. And honestly, Megyn, if you don't like it, I'm sorry. I've been very nice to you, although I could probably maybe not be based on the way you have treated me, but I wouldn't do that. >> (voiceover): The way Trump sees media, the way he sees life, is all, "They like me or they don't like me." And in that moment, I got moved from the "she likes me" category into the "she doesn't like me." And I do believe, I believe that night, the anger was real. His anger at me was real that night. (on

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Thank you all very much. And that will do it for the first Republican primary debate night of the 2016 presidential race. Our thanks to the candidates, who will now... >>

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The man who had fed conflict on reality TV now had a much larger stage. And after the debate, he used it. (cameras clicking, people talking in background) >> Donald Trump shows up as if he needed this hit of adrenaline before he went home to New York. >> You guys okay? Don't hurt yourselves. >> It was like mosquitos to... to a lantern on a summer night. I mean, the entire national press corps descended. >> People were being trampled, and camera equipment was flying all over the place, and I'd never seen a scene like this. I mean, I've seen many media stampedes, but nothing like that. >> What's your history with Megyn? >> I think Megyn behaved very badly, personally. >> The question about women, you didn't like that? >> No, I thought it was an unfair question. They didn't ask those questions of anybody else, and I thought it was an unfair question. But you know what, the answer is... >> It was just the beginning. >> Are you going to call Roger Ailes about it? >> At 3:40 in the morning, he lit up Twitter. >> "Wow, @megynkelly really bombed tonight. "People are going wild on Twitter! Funny to watch." (tweets) >> On the phone with CNN, he went further. >> What is it with you and Megyn Kelly? >> She starts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions. And, you know, you could see there was blood coming out of her eyes. Uh, blood coming out of her wherever. >> Trump recognized that it was a good storyline. And he kept fuel going under that fire, because he knew some portion of his audience loved to see him challenging, you know, a powerful woman, never mind a woman at Fox. Um, and so he accurately deduced that this would drive his numbers up with some segment of his base. >> Trump had a powerful ally

in the attack on Kelly

the right-wing website Breitbart and its leader, Steve Bannon. >> Fox has chosen a side. It's so evident in that debate that they're there to kneecap Donald Trump, okay? They're there to take him out. And that's when we go, "Okay." We run 20 stories on Megyn Kelly. I get Tony Lee and Matt Boyle, my two hammers. They go right after Megyn Kelly. We're going to Alinsky her, right? We're going to cut her out from the, cull her out from the herd and just hit her nonstop. That's when all war broke out. That's when-- that's when Breitbart, that's when you had to choose sides. >>

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In taking on Fox, Bannon and Trump were inciting the kind of conflict Breitbart readers thrived on. >> "She is a low-life (bleep). Everyone stop watching..." >> "We need to chop her off at the knees. Do not watch..." >> If you look at the comments section, these things were getting ten to 15,000, 20,000 comments. >> "Megyn's the type for a quicky in the men's room." >> The whole Trump, all the Pepes, all these Trump guys were pounding in here. >> "Kelly needs to be put in her place. Fast. And hard. By all of us." >> It was scary at times. And Breitbart kept lighting the fire, over and over. And you know, I had-- and have-- three young kids, really young kids, and the security threats were escalating. And we were doing everything in our power to convey to them that they needed to stop. It was... it was one debate question, just one debate question. And he handled it fine. You know, he did. So get off of it. And they couldn't have cared less. >> Roger Ailes ran Fox News. Ruthless and powerful, Ailes was a force to be reckoned with. >> Ailes calls me up and says, "You got to knock off these stories. "She's crying, she's all upset, she's getting death threats." I go, "Sounds like a personal problem." I said, "We're not backing off, we're going to... We're going to put more stories up tomorrow." >> "If Kelly can't take the heat, go back to the kitchen." >> "Trump should commission a statue of Ms. Kelly on her knees and place it in front of Trump Tower." >> Under the onslaught, Ailes eventually backed down. He needed Breitbart, Bannon, and Trump more than he needed Kelly. >> Roger definitely felt that he had to keep that sort of Breitbart wing of the viewership onboard. That they were at risk thanks to Trump's attacks on me and Fox in the wake of that debate. And he definitely wasn't going to lose 30% of the viewers, as this man-- who by August of 2015, we knew was the likely Republican nominee-- he didn't want that guy to be driving a division between Roger and the viewers. >> Trump had won. And it was a sign of what was to come-- brutal, divisive, anything goes. >> What Republican voters were looking for was strength. And in that moment, here's what voters saw. They saw a generation of Republican politicians who kowtowed to Fox News, who genuflected. Then they saw somebody take on Fox News, and Trump won. He broke Fox News. In the steel-cage death match of Republican politics, in that instant, Donald Trump became king.