Ben Shapiro Says Tucker-Putin Interview Will Be a ‘Bad Act of Journalism’ if He Gives a ‘Massage’ to Russian Dictator
Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro offered a qualified defense of Tucker Carlson’s forthcoming interview with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin on Thursday.
Shapiro, who has feuded with Carlson in recent months, condemned European Union officials for reportedly considering sanctioning Carlson over the interview, characterizing such a decision as emblematic of “the unbelievable stupidity of politics.”
“People who claim that they have any sort of principle abandon those principles at the first sign that those principles might be harmful to their political interests,” lamented Shapiro. “If the case that Tucker is making is that the E.U. is perfectly happy to shut down freedom of speech, but then they complain when Vladimir Putin does it, they’re making Tucker’s case for him.”
The popular podcaster also articulated his own conception of what would make the interview either worthwhile or shameful, specifically suggesting that Carlson should press Putin on his unjust imprisonment of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich:
Now, I haven’t seen the interview with Vladimir Putin. You haven’t seen the interview with Vladimir Putin. No one has seen the interview with Vladimir Putin. That interview is supposed to hit the airwaves tonight on X. And as I’ve said, I’m not going to prejudge the interview. The question is whether Tucker asked him any hard questions or whether it was sort of a massage.
Yeah, I don’t know, because I haven’t seen it. It will be a bad act of journalism if Tucker does not ask him some questions about Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter who’s being held by Vladimir Putin as effectively a hostage. Or if he doesn’t ask him about what the end of the war looks like, or he doesn’t push him on his murderous record, or his abuse of human rights and his targeting of civilians in Ukraine and all the rest, right? There are a bunch of questions that Tucker ought to ask, but Tucker hasn’t asked any of those questions publicly ye, so I have no idea what he asked.
Tucker Carlson is set to release his interview with Vladimir Putin tonight. Apparently, some idiots in the EU want to sanction him. Guys, way to show that your criticisms of Putin’s crackdowns on the press are totally hypocritical.
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) February 8, 2024
Gershkovich’s work and continued captivity belies Carlson’s argument that Western media intentionally ignores the Russian perspective on world events.
Carlson has previously suggested that American policymakers only “hate” Russia because its society is supposedly based around “Christian precepts” and argued that Shapiro’s concern for Israel in the wake of the October 7 terror attack last year demonstrated that the Jewish conservative doesn’t “care” about the United States.
