NSA Review Found No Evidence Tucker Carlson Was Targeted, Concluded His Name Was ‘Unmasked’ in Others’ Communications: Report
Last month, Tucker Carlson told his Fox News audience that the National Security Agency had been monitoring his communications “in an attempt to take this show off the air.”
He said that a “whistleblower… who is in a position to know, repeated back to us information about a story that we are working on that could have only come directly from my texts and emails. There’s no other possible source for that information, period.”
Now, The Record has reported, “The NSA has found no evidence to support Tucker Carlson’s accusations that the agency had been spying on him in an effort to knock his show off the air,” according to two sources the outlet spoke with.
What the NSA did find was that Carlson had been mentioned by third parties in their communications, and that his name was revealed through “unmasking,” whereby qualified government officials may request the divulgence of the identities of U.S. citizens who are mentioned in intelligence reports.
The sources would not disclose the third parties in whose communications Carlson’s name was mentioned.
The day after Carlson initially made his claim on air, the NSA took the highly unusual step of issuing a public statement. It called allegation “untrue,” and stated, “Tucker Carlson has never been an intelligence target of the Agency and the NSA has never had any plans to try to take his program off the air.”
A statement from NSA regarding recent allegations: pic.twitter.com/vduE6l6YWg
— NSA/CSS (@NSAGov) June 30, 2021
According to an Axios report, shortly before Carlson claimed the NSA was spying on him, the Fox News host was speaking with “U.S.-based Kremlin intermediaries about setting up an interview with Vladimir Putin.”
A Fox News spokesperson told The Record that Carlson’s unmasking is “entirely unacceptable.”
“For the NSA to unmask Tucker Carlson or any journalist attempting to secure a newsworthy interview is entirely unacceptable and raises serious questions about their activities as well as their original denial, which was wildly misleading,’ the statement said.
One former government official told The Record that it’s possible that the FBI offered to give Carlson a “defensive briefing” in which he was warned that he may be the target of a foreign intelligence influence campaign. Based on this, said the former official, it’s possible Carlson concluded the government was spying on him.
