Hannity has been criticized as being overly favorable to the candidacy of Donald Trump, and granting Trump more airtime than other presidential candidates during the 2016 primaries. Hannity, for instance, let Trump promote the false claim that Rafael Cruz, father of Trump's rival presidential candidate Ted Cruz, was involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination. He admitted to favoring Republican candidates, though without indicating a preference for Donald Trump over Ted Cruz. According to Dylan Byers of CNN, Hannity during interviews "frequently cites areas where he agrees with Trump, or where he thinks Trump was right about something, then asks him to expand on it", and "often ignores or defends Trump from criticism".