Swan Shreds McConnell, Carlson’s Kremlin Cowardice | Winners & Losers in Today’s Green Room

Axios reporter Jonathan Swan has established himself as a tough and unflinching interviewer, unfazed by any power or influence wielded by the person sitting in the chair across from him, and he brought that skill set to a sit-down with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Thursday.

Swan noted that McConnell is attributed by many as engaging in a “ruthless style of politics” and asked the top Senate Republican “where do you draw your moral red lines?”

McConnell scoffed at the question and joked, “I didn’t realize I was known for playing a ruthless style, my wife thinks I am a really nice guy.”

Swan didn’t let up, grilling McConnell about the contradiction between his remarks on Jan. 6 in the immediate aftermath of the attack on the U.S. Capitol and his subsequent willingness to support former President Donald Trump’s re-election in 2024.

McConnell made multiple efforts to dodge or deflect, but Swan was undeterred, asking follow-up questions that revealed how well he had researched for this interview.

In another segment of the interview, Swan pressed McConnell on some of the, shall we say, ethically challenged GOP Senate candidates, including Herschel Walker, the former football star and Georgia candidate whose is credibly accused of threatening to kill both an ex-wife and an ex-girlfriend.

McConnell tried to brush it off as “almost every candidate’s had troubled periods,” when Swan jumped in to point that not “almost every” candidate had pointed a gun at their significant other’s head. Eventually McConnell just admitted that Walker was “completely electable.”

With Republicans poised to take back the Senate majority after the midterms, McConnell’s views and “moral red lines” are a vitally important topic with enormous implications for the country. Kudos to Swan for putting the senator in the hot seat and never letting up.

It is a stunning contrast to observe the bravery and grace shown by Fox News correspondent Benjamin Hall, who was grievously wounded in a Russian attack while covering the war in Ukraine, and the petty complaints spewed nightly from the mouth of Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson, as he sits safe and pampered in an air-conditioned television studio.

Not everyone is cut out to be a war correspondent on the front lines, and that’s fine. Your friendly neighborhood Mediaite newsletter correspondent is typing this from the comfort of home, where the challenges rarely rise above the level of glitchy wifi that needs to be rebooted.

But Carlson has gone out of his way to push pro-Russian talking points and misinformation about the situation in Ukraine, in a deliberately provocative fashion that doesn’t just sound like propaganda drafted by the Kremlin, but that has actually been used by Moscow state media in that way. He’s bristled at any critics who question why he’s so pro-Russia.

But Thursday night’s comments stand out in Carlson’s long record of mendacity and Kremlin sympathizing. After acknowledging that Russian soldiers had “committed atrocities,” he reverted back to attacking the media coverage of the war.

“Some number” of these atrocities “must be real,” he said, “but we can also be dead certain that the war is not, despite what they tell us, a childish tale of good versus evil.”

Carlson likes to rail against the convenient anonymous foe of “they” who “tell us” what we’re supposed to believe. But it is evil to deliberately target civilians. It is evil to shoot unarmed noncombatants with their hands tied behind their backs. It is evil to bomb hospitals.

That’s not a “childish tale,” but a horrifyingly long list of war crimes, documented by a diverse swath of news organizations around the globe — including the one that employs Carlson!

It is evil, period. And it’s pathetic that Carlson tries to say it’s not.