38 Times Tucker Carlson Made Me Think, ‘You’ve Gotta Be F*cking Kidding Me’
In two years working at Mediaite, I watched more hours of Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News than should be legally allowable. Forget hazard pay. My boss should be in a dock at The Hague.
When I wrote a post on Friday about the latest outrageous thing he said, I had no way of knowing it would be one of the last statements he ever made on the network. On Monday, the network unceremoniously sent him packing amid legal drama that brought Fox immense amounts of negative press. We’ve covered these extensively, so there is no need to review here.
Instead, I want to share some of the moments on his show that, over the last two years, made me think to myself, “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.”
The more I watched Carlson’s show, the more desensitized I became to the poison he spewed on a nightly basis. It was necessary for my sanity’s sake. Still, he was constantly finding new ways to shock, usually by going lower and lower because there was no bottom.
To be clear, I make no claim that the following list is the definitive rundown of his most ludicrous commentaries on his Fox News program. What follows is simply a catalog of those moments I personally documented for Mediaite. In some instances, I undoubtedly missed a handful of moments that, had I seen them, I would have written about. The list is in reverse chronological order, as I made no attempt to rank them in any fashion. Some posts I’ve written about him have been omitted because they would either be redundant or simply did not make the cut. All entries are excerpts from the original articles. Some have been lightly edited for clarity. Each is accompanied by the date of the show with a link to the original post.
Just as Carlson was great for ratings on Fox News, he was great for Mediaite’s web traffic. I can’t speak for this website, but I will not miss him. And while I am under no illusion that he will somehow quietly retreat into private life forever, this is a much-needed breather.
1. Tucker Carlson Claims Biden Has Been ‘Getting Black People to Sell More Weed in the Cities’
“If you wanted more Black home appraisers why wouldn’t you start a program to train them?” he said. “No. The only job training program this administration has gotten behind in two and a half years is getting Black people to sell more weed in the cities.” – 4/21/23
2. Tucker Carlson Laughs at All the Twitter Employees Elon Musk Laid Off
“I had dinner with somebody who runs a big company recently, He said, ‘I’m really inspired by Elon.’ And I said, ‘The free speech stuff?’ He goes, ‘No, the firing the staff stuff!’”
Carlson ended his anecdote by laughing. – 4/17/23
3. Tucker Carlson Claims ‘American Soldiers Are Fighting Russian Soldiers’ After Fox News Reports That’s Not Actually Happening
“Briefing slides prepared by the U.S. government began to show up among other places on Twitter,” he said. “And the slides show that this is in fact not Ukraine’s war. It’s our war. The United States is a direct combatant in a war against Russia. As we speak, American soldiers are fighting Russian soldiers.” – 4/13/23
4. Tucker Carlson Says Black Lawmaker ‘Probably’ Got Into Bowdoin Because He’s Not White
“Justin Pearson wasn’t White. That’s probably how he got into Bowdoin in the first place.” – 4/12/23
5. Tucker Carlson Calls Trump Indictment Worse ‘Than Anything We Saw on Jan. 6’
“If you believe in our system and you want it to continue, you have to raise your hand and say, ‘Stop, because this is too great an assault in our system’ – much greater than anything we saw on Jan. 6, that’s for certain,” he said. – 3/30/23
6. Tucker Carlson Says Jan. 6 Is ‘Second Only to the 2020 Election as the Biggest Scam in My Lifetime’
“Jan. 6 I think is probably second only to the 2020 election as the biggest scam in my lifetime,” Carlson responded. “And you know it is because they become completely hysterical when confronted with any facts that deviate from their lies.” – 3/15/23
7. Tucker Carlson Ignores Plea from Dead Police Officer’s Family to Stop Mentioning Him and ‘Leave Us the Hell Alone’
In addition to Sicknick, four officers who responded to the riot subsequently committed suicide. While it is unclear how much of a role the riot played in those deaths – if any – Carlson dismissed the idea they’re related. – 3/8/23
8. Tucker Carlson Airs Jan 6. Footage to Rewrite the History of the Capitol Riot: ‘They Were Sightseers’
“The overwhelming majority weren’t [violent],” he said. “They were peaceful. They were orderly and meek. These were not insurrectionists. They were sightseers. Footage from inside the Capitol overturns the story you’ve heard about Jan. 6. Protesters queue up in neat little lines. They give each other tours outside the speaker’s office. They take cheerful selfies and they smile. They’re not destroying Capitol. They obviously revere the Capitol.” 3/6/23
9. Tucker Carlson Describes Himself Perfectly in Rant About ‘Weak Men’ Who ‘Will Do Anything to Save Themselves’
“They’re the most dangerous – men with no principles but the desire for self-preservation, hollow men who live in terror of being revealed for who they really are, men who will do anything to save themselves,” Carlson said, shortly after it was revealed he sought the termination of a Fox News colleague over a fact check that said is helping tanking Fox’s stock price. – 3/2/23
10. Tucker Carlson Complains Biden Is Appointing Too Many Non-Whites to Federal Courts: ‘Race-Based Hiring’
“He found that out of 97 federal judges confirmed under Joe Biden, the total number of White men – five!” Carlson said. “Twenty-two are Black women. So, this is race-based hiring. It’s illegal, but it’s also not about looking like America. It’s about punishing people.” – 2/6/23
11. Tucker Carlson Ignores Virtually Every George Santos Lie to Say the Media Covers Him for Lying About Playing Volleyball
“It’s not just that George Santos claimed he once played volleyball in college,” he said. “It’s worse than that. Indescribably worse. George Santos told other people out loud – and CNN can exclusively confirm this – that he had a volleyball scholarship, perhaps the most coved credential in collegiate sports. But he didn’t it was all a facade.” – 2/2/23
12. Tucker Carlson Decries ‘What’s Happened’ in South Africa ‘Over the Past 29 Years’ – When Apartheid Ended
“And the promise was that race-blind justice, which is the entire foundation of the rule of law in the West – has been for centuries – is done. “The new model? South Africa. That’s the new model. South Africa, a country we never talk about because no one wants to admit what’s happened there over the past 29 years.” – 1/17/23
13. Tucker Carlson Makes Bonkers Claim Carl Bernstein ‘Literally Participated in an FBI Operation’ to Bring Down Nixon
“The funniest part was Bernstein – formerly of the Washington Post – who literally participated in an FBI operation – not guessing, documented – an FBI operation to drive a sitting, duly elected president from office. Carl Bernstein participated in that.” – 1/10/23
14. Tucker Carlson Defends Pro-Bolsonaro Rioters, Baselessly Declares Brazil’s Election Was ‘Rigged’
“Consider what is happening tonight in Brazil,” he said. “Thanks to what was very clearly a rigged election, a convicted criminal – Lula da Silva – is now the president of the most important country in South America. Millions of people in Brazil understand exactly what happened. They know that their democracy has been hijacked, possibly forever.” – 1/9/23
15. Tucker Carlson Claims Lindsey Graham’s ‘Personal Life’ Explains His Support for Ukraine: ‘Something’s Going on There’
“So, it’s really hard to overstate how crazy this is,” Carlson reacted. “And you don’t want to play shrink and wonder about, you know, what emptiness at the core of Lindsey Graham’s personal life causes him to identify so strongly with a country he’s not a citizen of. Something’s going on there.” – 12/22/22
16. Tucker Carlson Ignores Pelosi Suspect’s MAGA Grievances in the Very Criminal Complaint He Cites to Cast Doubt on Motive
“There is much in the story that remains muddy. How in fact did DePape get inside the home? That’s the first question.” – 10/31/22
17. Tucker Carlson Leans Into Q-Anon Conspiracy Theory, Says Democratic Party Is ‘A Child Sacrifice Cult’
“Abortion politics is a total fixation of Democratic donors,” he said. “It’s the main thing they care about. Why is that, by the way? It’s a religion. It’s a child sacrifice cult.” – 10/24/22
18. Tucker Carlson Deems Monkeypox ‘Schlong Covid’ After Viewers Vote to ‘Rename’ Disease Disproportionately Affecting Gay Men
“So, we had a vote. There was no ballot harvesting. You can trust our counting. And the new name for monkeypox is now officially – and we’re declaring it – schlong covid.” – 7/28/22
19. Tucker Carlson and Jason Chaffetz Mock Pelosi Over Swimsuit Photo
“Nancy Pelosi was so upset at the overturning of Roe v. Wade and Putin’s war of aggression in Ukraine, that she fled America over this last Fourth of July weekend,” said the Fox News host as the photo of Pelosi in a bathing suit appeared onscreen. “And we’re going to go out tonight by singeing your retinas with a photograph of that event.” – 7/6/22
20. Tucker Carlson Claims Mass Shooters ‘Are Going Nuts’ Because Women ‘Never Stop Lecturing Them About Their So-Called Privilege’
“And of course, they’re angry. They know that their lives will not be better than their parents’. They’ll be worse. That’s all but guaranteed. They know that. They’re not that stupid. And yet the authorities in their lives – mostly women – never stop lecturing them about their so-called privilege. ‘You’re male, you’re privileged!’
“Imagine that. Try to imagine an unhealthier, unhappier life than that. So, a lot of young men in America are going nuts. Are you surprised?” – 7/6/22
21. Tucker Carlson Says Buffalo Shooting Suspect Not Motivated by ‘Hateful Right-Wing Rhetoric,’ But ‘Mental Illness’
Carlson scoffed at the idea that the 18-year-old White man who wrote racist screeds before allegedly murdering 10 Black people in a Buffalo grocery store was motivated by “hateful right-wing rhetoric.”
“So they are continuing to tell you, in the face of all available evidence, that the mass murder you saw over the weekend in Buffalo was inspired by hateful right-wing rhetoric when in fact that mass murder was committed by someone with diagnosed mental illness that the adults around him apparently ignored,” he said. – 5/19/22
22. Tucker Carlson Tells Viewers Biden Is Sending ‘Men with Guns’ to Hunt Them Down Because They ‘Think the Wrong Things’
“So, one of our biggest law enforcement agencies has men with guns around the country doing so many things to stop disinformation and false narratives. Those aren’t even lies. They’re just deviations from approved script. [Secretary of Homeland Security] Mayorkas told us, again men with guns ‘plan to identify individuals who could be descending into violence.'” – 4/28/22
23. Tucker Carlson Calls Ukrainian Flags in Twitter Profiles a ‘Partisan Position’ Because Russia’s Invasion Is ‘Highly Complicated’
“In a single day last month, we watched, for example, our entire professional class dutifully change their Twitter avatars from, “Mask up!” to the now mandatory Ukrainian flag. There was no debate about doing this, no reflection. There was not even a real conversation. They just did it. Millions of people simply assumed reflexively a partisan position in a highly complicated foreign crisis.” – 3/15/22
24. Tucker Carlson Demands to See Ketanji Brown Jackson’s LSAT Scores: ‘Americans in a Democracy Have a Right to Know’
“So, is Ketanji Brown Jackson – a name that even Joe Biden has trouble pronouncing – one of the top legal minds in the entire country? We certainly hope so. Biden’s right. Appointing her is one of his gravest constitutional duties. So it might be time for Joe Biden to let us know what Ketanji Brown Jackson’s LSAT score was. How did she do on the LSATs? Why wouldn’t you tell us that? That would settle the question conclusively as to whether she’s a once-in-a-generation legal talent.”
Notably, there appears to be no record of Carlson publicly demanding to see the LSAT scores of other recent Supreme Court nominees, such as Amy Coney Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh, and Neil Gorsuch. – 3/2/22
25. Tucker Carlson Asks If AOC Is Making ‘An Invitation to a Booty Call’ In Video of Her Saying, ‘I’m Alone Today’
“‘I’m alone today,’ Ocasio-Cortez says pointedly at the camera.” Is it just us or does that sound like an invitation to a booty call? Maybe one step away from, “What are you wearing?” By the way, it’s a little strange. It’s definitely oversharing. And yet according to the book, oversharing is the key to Sandy Cortez’s success.” – 2/18/22
26. Tucker Carlson Rips ‘Little Fascist’ Jen Psaki, Calls Her ‘Spokeschick’ and ‘Honey’
“Politicians and their spokeschicks didn’t used to talk this way,” he said. “Go back to Oberlin, honey.” – 2/2/22
27. Tucker Carlson Calls Fauci a ‘Shorter Version of Benito Mussolini’ Who Took Over the U.S. and ‘Promptly Went Insane’
“After two years of being nonstop media adulation, Tony Fauci has morphed into an even shorter version of Benito Mussolini.” – 11/29/21
28. Tucker Carlson Wants to Know About Kamala Harris’ Dating History ‘Because That Would Be One of Those Blanks We’d Like to Fill In’
“So we would love to talk with Montel Williams about his torrid relationship with ‘Kam-uh-la’ or ‘Kah-muh-lah’ because that might be one of those blanks we’d like to fill in,” said Carlson, not specifying who the “we” consists of. “Anyway, he is always welcome on the show.” – 11/15/21
29. Tucker Carlson Previews Batsh*t Special That Alleges Liberals Will Conduct ‘Patriot Purge’ and Suggests 1/6 Was a ‘False Flag’
“It’s called ‘Patriot Purge,’” said Carlson. “We’re proud of it. Three episodes we believe answers those unanswered questions from January 6th. That day will affect your life. There’s no question. We hope you’ll watch it.” – 10/27/21
30. Tucker Carlson Mocks Promotion of Transgender Admiral: ‘How Long Will It Be Before Joe Biden Appoints His Horse to the Supreme Court?’
“Come on,” he said. “They’re daring you to sit there and not say this is ridiculous. But it is, sorry. It is ridiculous. Sorry, not playing along! But they don’t think it is. And so you have to ask yourself, how long will it be beforeJoe Biden appoints his horse to the Supreme Court?” – 10/21/21
31. Tucker Carlson Mocks Pete Buttigieg’s Paternity Leave, Says He’s ‘Trying to Figure Out How to Breastfeed’
“Pete Buttigieg has been on leave from his job since August after adopting a child – paternity leave, they call it – trying to figure out how to breastfeed. No word on how that went.” – 10/14/21
32. Tucker Carlson Laments Ivermectin Shortage With Doc Who Claims It Treats Covid: ‘But You Can Buy Xanax By the Pound’
Carlson claimed that large chain pharmacies are in some cases refusing to fill prescriptions for ivermectin.
“But you can buy Xanax by the pound,” he said, referring to a benzodiazepine which you definitely cannot purchase “by the pound.” – 9/20/21
33. Tucker Carlson Defends People Who Buy Fake Vaccination Cards: ‘Act of Desperation by Decent, Law-Abiding Americans’
“Buying a fake vaccination card is not a, quote, “serious crime.” It’s not even close to a serious crime. Buying a fake vaccination card is an act of desperation by decent, law-abiding Americans who have been forced into a corner by tyrants. You know what’s a serious crime? Forcing Americans to take drugs they don’t need or want. That’s a very serious crime. And let’s hope, in the end, someone is punished for it, severely.” – 9/2/21
34. Tucker Carlson Calls Effort to Evacuate Afghan Refugees to U.S. ‘Operation Change America Forever’
“What’s so interesting – the contrast that informs this really – is that over the past week get this same administration has overseen the evacuation of tens of thousands of unvetted Afghan nationals, many of whom will now be moved into neighborhoods around the United States and stay permanently. They didn’t seem to encounter any problems in doing this. Thanks to meticulous and thoughtful planning, Operation Change America Forever came off precisely according to plan.” – 8/31/21
35. Tucker Carlson Whitewashes Viktor Orbán’s Authoritarian Ways in Softball Interview
“Just a few years ago, his views would’ve seemed moderate and conventional. He believes families are more important than banks. He believes countries need borders. For saying these things out loud, Orbán has been vilified.” – 8/5/21
36. Tucker Carlson Spends Seven Minutes Reading a Random Twitter Thread to Explain Why Trump Supporters Think the Election Was Rigged
Tucker Carlson’s writers had a lighter-than-usual workload on Friday as the Fox News host decided to spend seven minutes reading a Twitter thread posted by an unverified account in an effort explain why many Americans think the 2020 presidential election was rigged for Joe Biden.
“That is true,” Carlson concluded after reading the thread. “And every honest person knows it.” – 7/9/21
37. Tucker Carlson Compares Black MSNBC Contributor to Former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke: ‘Only the Colors Have Changed’
“His name is Eric Michael Dyson,” said Carlson, incorrectly stating the professor’s name before playing a clip from his MSNBC appearance. “He’s a tenured professor at some stupid college or other. He lives in a rich, almost exclusively White neighborhood. He goes on television a lot. Watch him as he talks about race and ask yourself – honestly – if he sounds any different at all from Bull Connor or say, David Duke. He doesn’t. Only the colors have changed.” – 6/24/21
38. Tucker Carlson Urges Audience to ‘Call the Police Immediately’ if They See Kids Wearing Masks Outdoors
“As for forcing children to wear masks outside, that should be illegal. Your response when you see children wearing masks as they play should be no different from your response to seeing someone beat a kid in Walmart. Call the police immediately, contact child protective services. Keep calling until someone arrives. What you’re looking at is abuse, it’s child abuse and you are morally obligated to attempt to prevent it.” – 4/26/21
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
