Tucker Carlson facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Tucker Carlson
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Carlson in 2023
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Tucker McNear Carlson
May 16, 1969 San Francisco, California, U.S.
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| Education | Trinity College (BA) |
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| Political party | Republican (since 2020) |
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Susan Andrews
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| Children | 4 |
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Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson (born May 16, 1969) is an American conservative political commentator and writer who hosted the nightly political talk show Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News from 2016 to 2023. Since his contract with Fox News was terminated, he has hosted Tucker on X. An advocate of former U.S. President Donald Trump, Carlson has been described as "perhaps the highest-profile proponent of 'Trumpism'", and as "the most influential voice in right-wing media, without a close second."
Carlson began his media career in the 1990s, writing for The Weekly Standard and other publications. He was a CNN commentator from 2000 to 2005 and a co-host of Crossfire, the network's prime-time news debate program, from 2001 to 2005. From 2005 to 2008, he hosted the nightly program Tucker on MSNBC. In 2009, he became a political analyst for Fox News, appearing on various programs before launching his own show. In 2010, Carlson co-founded and served as the initial editor-in-chief of the right-wing news and opinion website The Daily Caller, until selling his ownership stake and leaving in 2020. He has written three books: Politicians, Partisans, and Parasites (2003), Ship of Fools (2018), and The Long Slide (2021).
Described as a leading voice of White grievance politics, Carlson is known for circulating far-right ideas into mainstream politics and discourse. He has promoted conspiracy theories on topics such as demographic replacement, COVID-19, the January 6 United States Capitol attack, and Ukrainian bioweapons; and has been noted for false and misleading statements about these and other topics. Carlson's remarks on race, immigration, and women – including slurs he said on air between 2006 and 2011 – have been described by some as racist and sexist, and provoked advertiser boycotts of Tucker Carlson Tonight. In April 2023, Fox News dismissed Carlson and canceled his show without any explanation. Tucker Carlson Tonight had at that point been one of the most-watched cable news shows in the country. Carlson was among the hosts named in the Dominion Voting Systems v. Fox News Network defamation lawsuit for broadcasting false statements about the plaintiff company's voting machines that Fox News settled for $787.5 million and required Fox News to acknowledge that the broadcast statements were false.
Carlson is a critic of immigration. Formerly an economic libertarian, he now supports protectionism. In 2004, he renounced his initial support for the Iraq War, and has since been skeptical of U.S. foreign interventions. He was said to have influenced some of Trump's decisions as president, including the cancellation of a military strike against Iran in 2019, the dismissal of John Bolton as National Security Advisor the same year, and the commutation of Roger Stone's prison sentence in 2020, and would criticize Trump when he believed he was straying from "Trumpism". Carlson has often defended Russian President Vladimir Putin. In February 2024, he became the first Western journalist to interview Putin since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Early life and education
Carlson was born Tucker McNear Carlson at the Children's Hospital in San Francisco, California, on May 16, 1969. He is the elder son of Lisa McNear (née Lombardi; 1945–2011), an artist from San Francisco, and Dick Carlson (1941–), a former "gonzo reporter" who became the director of Voice of America, president of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the U.S. ambassador to the Seychelles, and more recently a director at the lobbying firm Policy Impact Strategic Communications. Carlson's brother, Buckley Peck Carlson, later Buckley Swanson Peck Carlson, is nearly two years younger and has worked as a communications manager and a Republican Party political operative.
Carlson's paternal grandparents were Richard Boynton and Dorothy Anderson, who were teenagers when they placed his father at The Home for Little Wanderers orphanage, where he was fostered by Carl Moberger of Malden, near Boston, a tannery worker of Swedish descent, and his wife Florence Moberger. Carlson's father was adopted at the age of two by upper-middle-class New Englanders, the Carlsons, an executive at the Winslow Brothers & Smith Tannery of Norwood (the oldest tannery in America) and his wife. Carlson's maternal great-great-great-grandfather was Henry Miller, the "Cattle King". Carlson's maternal great-great-grandfather Cesar Lombardi immigrated to New York from Switzerland in 1860. Carlson is also a distant relative of Massachusetts politicians Ebenezer R. Hoar and George M. Brooks. Carlson himself was named after his great-great-great-grandfather Dr. J. C. Tucker and his great-great-grandfather George W. McNear. Carlson is of one thirty-second Italian-Swiss ancestry.
In 1976, Carlson's parents divorced after the nine-year marriage reportedly "turned sour". Carlson's father was granted custody of Tucker and his brother. Carlson's mother left the family when he was six and moved to France. The boys never saw her again.
When Carlson was in first grade, his father moved Tucker and his brother to the La Jolla neighborhood of San Diego, California, and raised them there. Carlson attended La Jolla Country Day School and grew up in a home overlooking the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club. His father owned property in Nevada, Vermont, and islands in Maine and Nova Scotia. In 1984, his father unsuccessfully challenged the incumbent Republican Party Mayor Roger Hedgecock in the San Diego mayoral race.
In 1979, Carlson's father married Patricia Caroline Swanson, an heiress to Swanson Enterprises, daughter of Gilbert Carl Swanson and niece of Senator J. William Fulbright. Though Patricia remained a beneficiary of the family fortune, the Swansons had sold the brand to the Campbell Soup Company in 1955 and did not own it by the time of Carlson's father's marriage. This was the third marriage for Swanson, who legally adopted Tucker Carlson and his brother.
Carlson was briefly enrolled at Collège du Léman, a boarding school in the canton of Geneva in French-speaking Switzerland, but said he was "kicked out". He attained his secondary education at St. George's School, a boarding school in Middletown, Rhode Island, where he started dating his future wife, Susan Andrews, the headmaster's daughter. He then spent four years attending Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut and graduated in 1991 with a B.A. in history. Carlson's Trinity yearbook describes him as a member of the "Dan White Society", an apparent reference to the American political assassin who murdered San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. After college, Carlson tried to join the Central Intelligence Agency, but his application was denied, after which he decided to pursue a career in journalism with the encouragement of his father, who advised him that "they'll take anybody".
Career
Carlson began his career in journalism as a fact-checker for Policy Review, a national conservative journal then published by The Heritage Foundation and later acquired by the Hoover Institution. He then worked as an opinion writer at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newspaper in Little Rock, Arkansas, before joining The Weekly Standard news magazine in 1995. Writer Andrew Ferguson, who served as senior editor of The Weekly Standard said that Carlson "had as much talent as anybody who ever came through the door." Carlson sought a role with the publication after hearing of its founding, fearing he would be "written off as a wing nut" if he instead joined The American Spectator.
In 1999, Carlson interviewed then-Governor George W. Bush for Talk magazine. The piece led to bad publicity for Bush's 2000 presidential campaign. Bush claimed that "Mr. Carlson misread, mischaracterized me. He's a good reporter, he just misunderstood about how serious that was. I take the death penalty very seriously." Among liberals, Carlson's piece received praise, with Democratic consultant Bob Shrum calling it "vivid". Carlson said of the interview, "I thought I'd be ragged for writing a puffy piece. My wife said people are going to think you're hunting for a job in the Bush campaign."
Further into his career in print, Carlson worked as a columnist for New York magazine and Reader's Digest; writing for Esquire, Slate, The Weekly Standard, The New Republic, The New York Times Magazine, The Daily Beast, and The Wall Street Journal. John F. Harris of Politico would later remark on how Carlson was "viewed ... as an important voice of the intelligentsia" during this period. While working on a story for New York covering the Taliban, Carlson, alongside his father, was involved in a plane crash as it made its landing on a runway in Dubai on October 17, 2001. Carlson's 2003 Esquire profile on his journey to Liberia alongside Reverend Al Sharpton and other civil and political rights activists would garner a nomination at the National Magazine Awards.
In his early television career Carlson wore bow ties, a habit from boarding school he continued on air until 2006.
On June 21, 2021, New York Times reporter Ben Smith reported that Carlson was a media source for several journalists and authors, including Michael Isikoff, Michael Wolff, Brian Stelter, and others who wrote critically of Donald Trump.
CNN (2000–2005)
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In 2000, Carlson co-hosted the short-lived show The Spin Room on CNN. In 2001, he was appointed co-host of Crossfire, in which Carlson and Robert Novak represented the political right (alternating on different nights), while James Carville and Paul Begala, also alternating as hosts, represented the left.
Carlson's 2003 interview with Britney Spears, wherein he asked if she opposed the ongoing Iraq War and she responded, "[W]e should just trust our president in every decision he makes", was featured in the 2004 film Fahrenheit 9/11, for which she won a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Supporting Actress at the 25th Golden Raspberry Awards.
Jon Stewart debate
In October 2004, comedian and The Daily Show host Jon Stewart appeared on Crossfire, ostensibly to promote America (The Book), but he instead launched into a critique of Crossfire, saying the show was harmful to political discourse in the U.S. Carlson was singled out by Stewart for criticism, with Carlson in turn criticizing Stewart for being biased toward the left. Carlson and Begala later recalled that Stewart and one of the book's co-authors, Ben Karlin, stayed at CNN for more than an hour after the show to discuss the issues he had raised on the air, with Carlson saying, "It was heartfelt. [Stewart] needed to do this." In 2017, The New York Times referred to Stewart's "on-air dressing-down" of Carlson as an "ignominious career [moment]" for Carlson, leading to the show's cancellation. The Atlantic suggested that Stewart's appearance was a turning point leading to how Carlson remade himself.
On January 5, 2005, CNN chief Jonathan Klein told Carlson the network had decided not to renew his contract. CNN announced that it was ending its relationship with Carlson and would soon cancel Crossfire. Carlson later said: "I resigned from Crossfire in April [2004], many months before Jon Stewart came on our show, because I didn't like the partisanship, and I thought in some ways it was kind of a pointless conversation."
PBS (2004–2005)
Carlson was hired to helm a new program for PBS in November 2003, Tucker Carlson: Unfiltered, which ran concurrently with Carlson's Crossfire gig on CNN. The show launched on June 18, 2004, and was, according to The New Yorker, "part of a broader effort to push PBS further to the right ideologically".
Carlson announced he was leaving the show roughly a year after it started on June 12, 2005, despite the Corporation for Public Broadcasting allocating money for another show season. Carlson wanted to focus on his new MSNBC show Tucker and said that although PBS was one of the "least bad" instances of government spending he disagreed with, it was still "problematic".
MSNBC (2005–2008)
Carlson's early evening show Tucker, originally titled The Situation With Tucker Carlson, premiered on June 13, 2005, on MSNBC. Rachel Maddow and Jay Severin featured as guests on a rotating panel. He also hosted a late-afternoon weekday wrap-up for the network during the 2006 Winter Olympics.
Tucker was canceled by the network on March 10, 2008, owing to low ratings; the final episode aired on March 14, 2008. He remained with the network as a senior campaign correspondent for the 2008 election. Brian Stelter, writing for The New York Times, reported that, "during Mr. Carlson's tenure, MSNBC's evening programming moved gradually to the left. His former time slots, 6:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m., were subsequently occupied by two liberals, Ed Schultz and Rachel Maddow." Carlson said the network had changed a lot and "they didn't have a role for me". Carlson described being fired by MSNBC as leading to a professional "meltdown". In discussing the termination, he described himself as "hav[ing] a lot of problems with authority and being told what to do. I don't react well to it. I become really aggressive[.]"
Media outside journalism (2006–2008)
Carlson was a contestant on season 3 of the reality show Dancing with the Stars, which aired in 2006; he was paired with professional dancer Elena Grinenko. Carlson took four-hour-a-day ballroom dance classes to prepare. In an interview a month before the show began, he lamented that he would miss classes during a two-week-long MSNBC assignment in Lebanon, saying, "It's hard for me to remember the moves." Carlson said he accepted ABC's invitation to perform because "I don't do things that I'm not good at very often. I'm psyched to get to do that." Carlson was the first contestant eliminated, on September 13, 2006.
Carlson had cameo appearances as himself in the Season 1 episode "Hard Ball" of 30 Rock and in a Season 9 episode of The King of Queens. He had a cameo appearance in the 2008 film Swing Vote, again playing himself.
The Daily Caller (2010–2020)
On January 11, 2010, Carlson and Neil Patel (a former aide to Dick Cheney, and former college roommate of Carlson) launched a political news website titled The Daily Caller. Carlson served as editor-in-chief, and occasionally wrote opinion pieces with Patel. The website was funded by the conservative activist Foster Friess. By February 2010, The Daily Caller was part of the White House rotating press pool. Carlson reportedly offered his employees free junk food, an unmonitored keg, provided them with a ping pong table, and allowed them to sleep under their desks.
In interviews, Carlson said The Daily Caller would not be tied to ideology but rather "breaking stories of importance", and "We're not enforcing any kind of ideological orthodoxy on anyone." Columnist Mickey Kaus quit after Carlson refused to run a column critical of Fox News's coverage of the immigration policy debate due to his contractual obligations to Fox News.
In June 2020, Carlson sold his one-third stake in The Daily Caller to Patel for an undisclosed amount and said "Neil [Patel] runs it. I wasn't adding anything. So we made it official".
Fox News Channel (2009–2023)
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In May 2009, Fox News announced that Carlson was being hired as a Fox News contributor. He was a frequent guest panelist on Fox's late-night satire show Red Eye w/Greg Gutfeld, made frequent appearances on the All-Star Panel segment of Special Report with Bret Baier, was a substitute host of Hannity in Sean Hannity's absence, and produced and hosted a special entitled Fighting for Our Children's Minds in September 2010.
On the eve of then-President Barack Obama's first debate with Mitt Romney in October 2012, Carlson publicized a 2007 video recording of then-Senator Obama criticizing the federal government's response to Hurricane Katrina and complimenting his pastor at the time, Reverend Jeremiah Wright. Wright's sermons had been a controversy in Obama's 2008 presidential campaign. Portions of the video had been available online since 2007.
In April 2013, Carlson replaced Dave Briggs as a co-host of Fox & Friends Weekend, joining Alisyn Camerota and Clayton Morris on Saturday and Sunday mornings.
Tucker Carlson Tonight (2016–2023)
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On November 14, 2016, Carlson began hosting Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News. The premiere episode of the show, which replaced On the Record, was the network's most watched telecast of the year in the time slot, with 3.7 million viewers.
Tucker Carlson Tonight aired at 7:00 p.m. each weeknight until January 9, 2017, when Carlson's show replaced Megyn Kelly at the 9:00 p.m. time slot after she left Fox News. In January 2017, Forbes reported that the show had "scored consistently high ratings, averaging 2.8 million viewers per night and ranking as the number two cable news program behind The O'Reilly Factor in December". In March 2017, Tucker Carlson Tonight was the most watched cable program in the 9:00 p.m. time slot.
On April 19, 2017, Fox News announced that Tucker Carlson Tonight would air at 8:00 p.m. following the cancellation of The O'Reilly Factor. Tucker Carlson Tonight was the third-highest-rated cable news show as of March 2018.
In October 2018, Tucker Carlson Tonight was the second-highest rated cable news show in prime time, after The Sean Hannity Show with Sean Hannity, with 3.2 million nightly viewers. By the end of 2018, the show had begun to be boycotted by at least 20 advertisers after Carlson said immigration makes the country "poorer, dirtier and more divided". According to Fox News, the advertisers only moved their ad buys to other programs.
By January 2019, Carlson's show dropped to third with 2.8 million nightly viewers, down six percent from the previous year. The show also lost at least 26 advertisers.
In March 2019, there were calls to fire Carlson from Fox News after Media Matters resurfaced remarks he had made over several years to the radio show Bubba the Love Sponge concerning women, Iraqis, and immigrants. His ratings rose eight percent that week despite the boycotts.
By August 2019, Media Matters calculated that some companies had fulfilled their media buy contracts and advertising inventory for the time slot and had now begun their purchases for other time slots on Fox News. At the close of 2019, Carlson's Nielsen ratings among all viewers 25–54 placed him second only to Fox's The Sean Hannity Show among cable news shows.
Beginning the week of June 8–14, 2020, Tucker Carlson Tonight became the highest-rated cable news show in the U.S., with an average of four million viewers, beating out the shows hosted by fellow Fox News pundits Hannity and Laura Ingraham. This came in the wake of Carlson's remarks criticizing the Black Lives Matter movement, which had caused some companies to pull their advertising from the show, including The Walt Disney Company, T-Mobile, and Papa John's.
By October 2020, Tucker Carlson Tonight averaged 5.3 million viewers, with the show's monthly average becoming the highest of any cable news program in history at that point. In the 25–54 demographic, the show maintained an average viewership of just over a million, with 670,000 being between 18 and 49. Carlson's program saw a dip in viewership following the aftermath of the 2020 election, losing out to Anderson Cooper 360° in the 25–54 demographic, which Carlson had maintained a hold of the prior month. In 2020, Tucker Carlson Tonight and The Sean Hannity Show became the first cable news programs to finish a full year with viewership in excess of four million.
In the week following the inauguration of Joe Biden as president, Tucker Carlson Tonight remained the only cable news program not to see a drop in viewership, slightly increasing from where it stood one week prior and reclaiming its lead among the 25–54 demographic. It remained the most-watched news-related cable show as of mid-2021. Through May 2022 it was a close second to The Five, while leading in the 25–54 demographic.
Tucker Carlson Today
In February 2021, Carlson announced a multiyear deal with Fox News to host a new weekly podcast and series of monthly specials dubbed Tucker Carlson Originals on sister streaming service Fox Nation, which released on March 29. In spring of 2021, he began hosting a show on Fox Nation called Tucker Carlson Today.
Departure from Fox News
On the morning of Monday, April 24, 2023, Fox News dismissed Carlson and the executive producer of his evening show. It does not appear that Carlson received advance notice of his dismissal, given that on Friday, April 21, in what became his final show's sign-off, he told his viewers that he would "be back on Monday". As of October 2023, a rotation of guest hosts fill Carlson's old slot until a permanent replacement is found. On April 26, Carlson responded to his departure by tweeting a video that was watched millions of times.
Fox did not provide a reason for Carlson's termination. The Los Angeles Times wrote that Chairman of Fox Corporation Rupert Murdoch was responsible for the firing, and that a pending lawsuit from former Fox producer Abby Grossberg and Carlson's coverage of the January 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection both influenced the decision. The Wall Street Journal wrote that Carlson was dismissed due to private messages in which he criticized Fox's management, using offensive language.
Tucker on Twitter / Tucker on X (since 2023)
In a video on his Twitter feed on May 9, 2023, Carlson said he would relaunch his show on Twitter. Just before making the announcement, Carlson's attorneys sent a letter to Fox executives, alleging that Rupert Murdoch and other senior executives "intentionally" broke their promises to him, an alleged breach of contract that he says ought to free him from his non-compete clause. Fox News reportedly sent him a cease and desist after the first episode aired.
The first episode of the show, called Tucker on Twitter, was released on June 6, 2023 and lasted just over 10 minutes. During the episode, Carlson claimed that the US had recovered an extraterrestrial starship and its pilot; that Volodymyr Zelensky is "sweaty and rat-like", and was persecuting Christians; that the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam was done by Ukrainian forces; that the Black Lives Matter riots were organized by an unknown entity; and that the truth behind the September 11 attacks was still classified.
In June 2023, he was reportedly seeking funds to start a new media company with Neil Patel.
On August 23, 2023, Carlson hosted Donald Trump on Tucker on X, the re-branded name of Twitter, deliberately to conflict with the first 2024 Republican debate.
He launched the streaming service Tucker Carlson Network in December, with both ad-supported and subscription-based content. Initially planned for Twitter/X, Musk's company was unable to deliver the needed technology. Justin Wells, a former executive producer at Fox for Carlson, will oversee programming.
Vladimir Putin interview
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Carlson traveled to Russia in February 2024 to interview President Vladimir Putin, whom he "has been an outspoken defender of". It was Putin's first one-on-one interview with a Western journalist since he launched the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Carlson said that while Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelenskyy had been given a platform, "not a single Western journalist has bothered to interview the president of the other country involved in this conflict, Vladimir Putin". This sparked backlash from American and European journalists, who pointed out that they had repeatedly been denied interviews with Putin, and that some had been expelled. The Kremlin Press Secretary, Dmitry Peskov, said Carlson had been allowed an interview because he "starkly contrasts with the stance of traditional Anglo-Saxon media".
Some independent Russian journalists were angered by Carlson's words, noting that at least 1,000 independent journalists had fled Russia due to new censorship laws that ban criticism of the war. They also highlighted that two American journalists were currently imprisoned by Russia: Evan Gershkovich of The Wall Street Journal and Alsu Kurmasheva of Radio Free Europe.
After the death of prominent Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny in a Russian prison days after the interview, Carlson faced fresh criticism for holding the interview with Putin. Carlson called Navalny's death "barbaric and awful" in a statement to The New York Times.
Writing
Carlson authored the memoir Politicians, Partisans, and Parasites: My Adventures in Cable News, published by Warner Books in September 2003, about his television news experiences. It received favorable reviews from Publishers Weekly and the Washingtonian, who both complimented the book for its humor.
In May 2017, Carlson, represented by the literary and creative agency Javelin, signed an eight-figure, two-book deal with Simon & Schuster's conservative imprint, Threshold Editions. His first book in the series, Ship of Fools: How a Selfish Ruling Class is Bringing America to the Brink of Revolution, was released in October 2018, and debuted at No. 1 on The New York Times Best Seller list. His second book, The Long Slide: Thirty Years in American Journalism, was released in August 2021.
In 2023, a biography of Carlson titled Tucker was released. The book was written by Chadwick Moore with the help of Carlson, who had given the author more than 100 hours of interviews. Moore had stated that the book was intended to tell the story of Carlson's exit from Fox News from the former host's perspective. The book performed poorly, with just over 3,000 copies sold during the first week after its release.
Political views
Carlson has been described in the media as a conservative, paleoconservative, right-wing extremist, and far right. In 2021, Time magazine said Carlson "may be the most powerful conservative in America". Writing for New York magazine's Intelligencer in 2019, Park MacDougald called Carlson a "Middle American radical", which he described as someone who holds populist economic beliefs; hostility to corporatocracy; fervent positions on nationalism, race, and immigration; and a preference for a strong U.S. president. MacDougald identified this form of radicalism as the ideological core of Trumpism. Carlson is noted for circulating white nationalist views and terminology into mainstream political discourse.
Carlson is a Republican. He was previously registered as a Democrat in Washington, D.C., from 2006 to 2020. In 2017, Carlson said his registration as a Democrat was to gain the right to vote in the primaries for mayoral elections in the district, and that he nevertheless "sincerely despise[s]" the Democratic Party and "always vote[d] for the more corrupt candidate over the idealist" in order to favor the status quo and stem progressivism. Carlson campaigned for Republicans and Republican-affiliated causes during his time as a Democrat.
Parties and candidates
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In public correspondence in Slate with Texas Monthly's Evan Smith on November 29, 1999, Carlson agreed with Smith's low opinion of Donald Trump, who was then running for president with the Reform Party. Carlson wrote that Trump was "the single most repulsive person on the planet" and that the Reform Party consisted of "a bunch of wackos". Separately, he criticized the party's eventual nominee, Pat Buchanan. In his 2018 book, Ship of Fools, Carlson wrote that he had adopted some of Buchanan's views.
Carlson voted for George W. Bush in the 2000 election. Carlson told Salon in 2003 that some Washington conservatives suspected he was "secretly liberal" because he liked John McCain. Carlson said in an interview, "by my criteria, Bush isn't much of a conservative". Carlson did not vote in the 2004 election, citing his souring on the Iraq War, his disillusionment with the once small-government Republican Party, and his disappointment with Bush and like-minded conservatives.
Carlson was reportedly floated as a potential candidate for the Libertarian nomination in the 2008 presidential election. He was included in polling at the 2008 Libertarian National Convention, with unconfirmed speculation arising that he was personally funding the effort. Carlson spoke at Ron Paul's independent Rally for the Republic convention, opposite the official 2008 Republican National Convention, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, which served as a "message of revolt to the Republican Party" and a general celebration of Paul's policy proposals.
He expressed his disappointment with the Republican nominee for the 2012 election, Mitt Romney, and the health care reform he signed in 2006 as governor of Massachusetts, which contained an individual mandate, saying, "out of 315 million Americans, the Republican Party managed to find the one guy who couldn't run on Obamacare".
Writing for Politico in January 2016, Carlson expressed his support for Donald Trump's candidacy and his positions, such as his proposed "Muslim ban", and criticized the other Republican candidates for not similarly making immigration a core issue. During the Trump presidency, Carlson was described in Politico as "perhaps the highest-profile proponent of 'Trumpism' – a blend of anti-immigrant nationalism, economic populism and America First isolationism". Carlson's commentaries did not uniformly praise Trump, but he had frequent scorn for Trump's critics; some commentators called Carlson an exemplar of "anti-anti-Trump" arguments. In March 2023, Carlson defended Trump after he was indicted in New York, calling the indictment "election interference". Despite his praise for Trump, he has at times been critical. Carlson criticized the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, ordered by Trump in January 2020 and said in June 2020 that Trump had let Black Lives Matter protests go too far. In private correspondence, he referred to Trump as a "demonic force" and wrote, "I hate him passionately".
Following the 2020 election, Carlson reportedly told people he had voted for independent candidate Kanye West, though Politico points out that it was unclear whether Carlson "was serious or merely joking". In July 2021, Carlson told Time magazine that the Republican Party is "inept and bad at governing" and "much more effective as an oppositional force than it is as a governing party".
Carlson supported J. D. Vance in the 2022 Republican U.S. Senate primary in Ohio and privately persuaded Trump to endorse him despite Vance's past anti-Trump comments. Former Hawaii congresswoman and Democratic presidential primary contender Tulsi Gabbard was a substitute host on Tucker Carlson Tonight in 2022; she appeared on the show the night she left the Democratic Party in October 2022, to Carlson's praise.
Guns
Carlson supports the right to keep and bear arms. He has opposed gun control and the assault weapons ban. He has debated several Democrats on gun control. In a 2019 interview, Carlson said he owns an AR-15 style rifle and said "all my guns are working-class guns". He has a concealed carry permit in the District of Columbia.
Economics
Early in his career, Carlson supported libertarian economics. He supported Ron Paul's 1988 presidential candidacy, when Paul ran as the candidate for the Libertarian Party, along with his 2008 presidential candidacy, when Paul ran as a Republican. Carlson said in 2004, "I hate all nanny-state regulations, such as seat belt laws and smoking bans." From 2009 through 2015, Carlson was a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.
Since 2018, he has promoted more populist economics, attacking libertarianism, saying "market capitalism is not a religion" and portraying some Republicans as "controlled by the banks". In an interview, he said that economic and technological change that occurs too quickly can cause widespread social and political upheaval, and praised President Theodore Roosevelt, saying his intervention in the economy in the early 1900s may have prevented a communist revolution in the United States. In 2019 on Tucker Carlson Tonight, Carlson said America's "ruling class" are, in effect, the "mercenaries" behind the decline of the American middle class, and "any economic system that weakens and destroys families is not worth having. A system like that is the enemy of a healthy society." He cited parallels between the problems of inner cities and rural areas as evidence that the "culture of poverty" cited by conservatives as the cause of urban decline "wasn't the whole story", and that "Certain economic systems allow families to thrive. Thriving families make market economies possible." In January 2019, Carlson used a Washington Post op-ed by Romney to criticize what he described as the "mainstream Republican" worldview, consisting of "unwavering support for a finance-based economy.
Carlson has criticized hedge funds (singling out the Republican donor Paul Singer in 2019) and private equity (in criticizing Mitt Romney, former CEO of Bain Capital). He described the business model of firms like Bain as: "Take over an existing company for a short period of time, cut costs by firing employees, run up the debt, extract the wealth and move on, sometimes leaving retirees without their earned pensions. ... Meanwhile, a remarkable number of the companies are now bankrupt or extinct." He attacked payday lenders, saying they "loan people money they can't possibly repay" and "charge them interest that impoverishes them" He praised Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren's economic plan and called her book The Two Income Trap "one of the best books I've ever read on economics".
Environment
On his show, Carlson frequently hosts guests who downplay the scientific consensus on climate change, and disagreed with Bill Nye on the subject. Carlson has also said that he does not consider climate change a threat. Carlson believes that global warming will have many positive effects on Earth, namely "more arable land in places like Canada and northern Europe".
In 2023, Carlson, Clean Ocean Action, and multiple Republicans criticized New Jersey and New York's use of wind power, falsely claiming that it has been contributing to the deaths of whales.
Foreign policy
Carlson is skeptical of foreign intervention, has expressed regret for his public support of the U.S. invading Iraq in 2003, and has said "the U.S. ought to hesitate before intervening abroad". Carlson is known for some defenses of authoritarian foreign leaders, including Vladimir Putin of Russia, Nayib Bukele of El Salvador, and Viktor Orbán of Hungary. Carlson was noted for defending Putin in the lead-up to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Carlson's praise for Orbán included a visit and his online film Hungary vs. Soros. and
Russia
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Carlson is sympathetic to Russian president Vladimir Putin, has defended Putin's Russia, and has promoted pro-Kremlin disinformation and propaganda.
Carlson said he does not consider Russia a serious threat to the United States, and called for the United States to work with Russia in the Syrian Civil War against a common enemy like the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS). He asserts that Putin does not hate the United States as much as American liberals do, and suggested there is no reason to dislike Putin, asking his viewers to consider whether Putin has ever called them racist or threatened to get them fired for disagreeing with him. Carlson said it is "not treason, it is not un-American" to support Putin.
In 2019, while discussing U.S. military aid to Ukraine during the Donbas War, Carlson said on his show: "Why shouldn't I root for Russia? Which I am". At the end of the show he claimed to have been joking. Afterwards, he explained: "I think we should probably take the side of Russia if we have to choose between Russia and Ukraine".
In early 2022, Carlson downplayed Russia's military buildup on Ukraine's borders as a "border dispute". Although Carlson called the Russian invasion of Ukraine "awful" and acknowledged Putin's responsibility, he has promoted pro-Russian disinformation since then, such as a Russian conspiracy theory that the U.S. and Kyiv were developing biological weapons in Ukraine. Many of Carlson's broadcasts have been used by Russian state media to support their messaging, and Mother Jones reported that the Kremlin sent a memo to state media outlets saying it was "essential" to use video clips of Carlson "as much as possible". Mother Jones further observed Carlson was the only Western media pundit that the Kremlin adopted in this way.
Carlson's views of Putin's Russia have changed markedly since the 2000s. Back then, he agreed that Russia was becoming a "police state" where "freedom of the press is disappearing", and said that Putin was "in league with our enemies".
Iraq
Carlson initially supported the Iraq War. A year after the invasion of Iraq, he began criticizing the war, telling The New York Observer: "I think it's a total nightmare and disaster, and I'm ashamed that I went against my own instincts in supporting it." In 2004, Carlson wrote a commentary in Esquire accusing Bush of weakness after the September 11 attacks and in the invasion of Iraq. Carlson said "Iraq is a crappy place filled with a bunch of, you know, semi-literate primitive monkeys, that’s why it wasn’t worth invading.".
Iran
In July 2017, Carlson said that "we actually don't face any domestic threat from Iran". He asked Max Boot to "tell me how many Americans in the United States have been murdered by terrorists backed by Iran since 9/11?" According to The New York Times, Carlson played an influential role in dissuading Trump from launching military strikes against Iran in response to the shooting down of an American drone in June 2019. Carlson reportedly told Trump that if he listened to his hawkish advisors and went ahead with the strikes, he would not win re-election. In 2019, Carlson lobbied Donald Trump to fire his national security advisor, John Bolton. Carlson said Bolton was "demented" for seeking a military strike against Iran and accused him of undermining Trump by disagreeing publicly with Trump's decisions. Trump fired Bolton on September 10, 2019. Carlson called the 2020 assassination of Qasem Soleimani a "quagmire". He criticized the "chest-beaters" who promote foreign interventions, particularly Senator Ben Sasse (R-NE), and asked, "By the way, if we're still in Afghanistan, 19 years, sad years, later, what makes us think there's a quick way out of Iran?"
Syria
Carlson opposes overthrowing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and has downplayed some of the Assad regime's human rights violations in the Syrian Civil War. In April 2018, Carlson questioned whether Assad was responsible for the Douma chemical attack that had occurred a few days earlier and killed dozens. In November 2019, Carlson repeated this claim and queried whether the attack had happened at all. Carlson suggested that a similar attack that occurred the year before (the Khan Shaykhun chemical attack), which was attributed to Assad's forces and which the OPCW JIM indicated was carried out with sarin that bore the regime's signature, was a false flag attack perpetrated to falsely implicate the Assad government. Carlson compared Assad's war crimes during the Syrian Civil War to Saudi Arabia's war crimes in Yemen.
Israel
In 2006, Carlson appeared live from Israel during the 2006 Lebanon War between Israel and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Early on in the conflict, Carlson proposed that Lebanon fight and push out Hezbollah instead of going to war with Israel. During the conflict, he criticized Syria's involvement in the conflict in supporting Hezbollah and later expressed some support for the Israel Defense Forces. However, he also criticized the tactics used by the Israel Defense Forces in fighting Hezbollah.
During the 2023 Israel-Hamas War, Carlson criticized both President Joe Biden and Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson support for military aid to Israel and called for American neutrality during the conflict. He declared Israel guilty of war crimes. Commentators have described him as part of a growing faction within the Republican Party that is indifferent to or directly opposed to Zionism.
Mexico
Carlson supported Trump's expansion of the Mexico–United States barrier, saying a wall was needed to "restore sovereignty" to the border.
In a July 2018 interview about Russian involvement in U.S. elections, Carlson claimed that Mexico had interfered in U.S. elections "more successfully" than Russia by "packing our electorate" through mass immigration. This assertion was disputed by journalist Philip Bump, who wrote that the number of Mexicans in the U.S. had decreased since 2009 and asked rhetorically: "What good has it done Mexico to have a number of its citizens move to the United States and gain the right to vote?"
In May 2019, Carlson defended Trump's decision to place tariffs on Mexico unless Mexico stopped illegal immigration to the United States. Carlson said, "When the United States is attacked by a hostile foreign power it must strike back, and make no mistake Mexico is a hostile foreign power."
North Korea
When President Trump met the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un at the country's border with the South in June 2019, Carlson, who was touring with Trump, defended Trump's friendship with Kim. Carlson told Fox & Friends that the North Korean regime was "monstrous" and North Korea was a "disgusting place" but "On the other hand, you've got to be honest about what it means to lead a country. It means killing people". Carlson went on to argue that "a lot of countries commit atrocities including a number that we're closely allied with".
China
Carlson has said normalization of relations with China following President Richard Nixon's 1972 visit led to unforeseen consequences, and that America became progressively worse off for it. He criticized LeBron James for speaking out against Daryl Morey, the latter having tweeted in support of the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests, and referred to the former CEO of The Walt Disney Company, Bob Iger, as a "propagandist" for the Chinese Communist Party.
On November 20, 2020, The New York Times reported that Steve Bannon and Chinese businessman Guo Wengui had brought Li-Meng Yan to America to promote the COVID-19 lab leak theory, a theory that states COVID-19 was made in a Chinese laboratory and then escaped from the lab. Bannon and Guo set up appearances for Yan on Carlson's show to promote the theory. Carlson would later say that he did not endorse her theories. Nonetheless, Carlson still hosted her on his show for a second appearance.
Immigration and race
Carlson is a frequent critic of immigration, and has been described by multiple writers as demonizing both documented and undocumented immigrants. White grievance politics is a persistent theme in Carlson's commentary.
Views on Islam
Carlson is critical of Islam and has hosted guests on his program that criticize Islam. He has described the existence of an "Islamic cult" and an "Islamic problem", describing it as a threat to the United States. He was critical of the Obama administration's terrorism policy, arguing that it should have considered Islam as a cause of terrorism.
Immigrants and the Great Replacement conspiracy theory
In 2018, Carlson described the effects of mass immigration on the United States using the terms dirtier, poorer, and more divided and said it "has badly hurt this country's natural landscape". On another 2018 episode, Carlson criticized multiculturalism in the United States, skeptically asking "how, precisely, is diversity our strength?" and whether any other institutions benefitted from a lack of commonalities. Talking about Hazleton, Pennsylvania, where Hispanics had quickly become a majority of the population, Carlson said it was "more change than human beings are designed to digest". In May 2019 he said, "The flood of illegal workers into the United States has damaged our communities, ruined our schools, burdened our healthcare system and fractured our national unity." In December 2019, he falsely claimed that immigrants were responsible for making the Potomac River "dirtier and dirtier".
Carlson has accused Democrats of supporting increased immigration to change the racial demographics of the United States to increase the Democratic voter base. Commentators and organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) have described these views as endorsement of the Great Replacement conspiracy theory. Carlson has also accused President Joe Biden of engaging in eugenics and "Great Replacement" through a policy of increased immigration. Despite this, Carlson has challenged accusations that he believes the Great Replacement conspiracy theory, describing it as a "voting rights question".
Personal life
Carlson is married to Susan Thomson Carlson (née Andrews). They met at St. George's School, where she was the daughter of the school's headmaster and priest. They were married on August 10, 1991, in the school chapel. They have four children. Carlson is left-handed and dyslexic.
Carlson was baptized as an Episcopalian but has said he grew up with secular beliefs; he credits his wife for his religious faith. He has said he stays in the church because he "loves the liturgy" and "likes the people".
Carlson is a Deadhead (a fan of the rock band Grateful Dead); he has attended more than fifty Dead concerts, and the title of his 2018 book Ship of Fools was inspired by the Grateful Dead song of the same name.
In 2011, a group of protesters gathered outside his house in Kent, Washington, D.C., to protest Carlson. In 2017, Carlson sold his home and purchased another nearby. In late 2018, protestors gathered in front of their home. In 2020, Carlson sold his home in Kent and bought a house on Gasparilla Island, on Florida's Gulf Coast, and in the summer of 2022, a second home next door.
They now also live part of the year in Maine near his "favorite place in the world", Bryant Pond, Woodstock, Maine.
In September 2022, Carlson spoke at the funeral of Hells Angels president Sonny Barger. Carlson said that he had been a fan of Barger since his college years, quoted Barger as saying "stay loyal, remain free, and always value honor", and added "I want to pay tribute to the man who spoke those words".
Published works
- Carlson, Tucker (2003). Politicians, Partisans, and Parasites: My Adventures in Cable News. New York: Warner Books. ISBN: 978-0759508002.
- Carlson, Tucker (2018). Ship of Fools: How a Selfish Ruling Class Is Bringing America to the Brink of Revolution. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN: 978-1501183669.
- Carlson, Tucker (2021). The Long Slide: Thirty Years in American Journalism. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN: 978-1501183690.
See also
In Spanish: Tucker Carlson para niños
