It Sure Seems Like Tucker Carlson Took a Shot at Jennifer Griffin When He Attacked Reporters Who ‘Didn’t Bother to do Any Reporting’
During a monologue on Thursday in which he alleged Ukraine is making biological weapons, Tucker Carlson scolded reporters who he claimed have been parroting “Pentagon talking points.”
That would include reporters at various networks, but most notable in this case is Fox News’ own National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin, who this week cited a Pentagon source to push back on the theory that Ukraine is making bioweapons.
To buttress his bioweapons claim, Carlson has pointed to the testimony of Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland. During a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday, Nuland was asked, “Does Ukraine have chemical or biological weapons?”
Nuland replied,
Ukraine has uh, biological research facilities, which, in fact we are now quite concerned Russian troops, Russia forces may be seeking to uh, gain control of. So, we are working with the Ukrainians on how they can prevent any of those research materials from falling into the hands of uh, Russian forces should they approach.
Carlson aired Nuland’s testimony on Wednesday and Thursday to suggest the U.S. has been lying about bioweapons in Ukraine. About an hour after Carlson mentioned the theory on his Wednesday show, Griffin appeared on Hannity and cited a Department of Defense “fact sheet.”
Regarding Nuland’s remarks, Sean Hannity stated, “We never got clarity.”
“Well, we do have clarity,” Griffin responded. “I have a fact sheet — that’s what I was just reading — from the Pentagon.”
She added,
It is a long program that has existed where the Pentagon has partnered with these bio-labs. These were Soviet-era labs that—remember the Nunn-Lugar Bill and trying to deal with proliferation when the Soviet Union ended—that is part of this effort to try to clean up those Soviet-era labs and make sure that nothing escapes from those labs. And so the U.S. has been very open about its involvement there with that. But what Russia does is they take that information, distort it, turn it around, and turn it into disinformation.
Griffin was referring to a 1991 law under which the U.S. would “secure and dismantle weapons of mass destruction and their associated infrastructure” stored in former Soviet republics – such as Ukraine – after the Russians had requested it.
She also appeared on multiple Fox News shows on Thursday to discuss the bio-labs.
Later in the evening, Carlson returned to the subject of bio-labs. This time he appeared to take a shot at Griffin and other reporters:
We do know that the Pentagon talking points you saw reported as fact on television today – and last night – were an utter lie. Did the reporters who repeated those talking points verbatim know they were a lie? Maybe they did. On the other hand, how would they know? They didn’t bother to do any reporting whatsoever. They got a text from some Biden administration flack and they just read it on the air like it was true.
You shouldn’t be surprised because that’s what they do. And it’s possible they’re afraid not to do that. They know if they stray from the script the White House has written for them, they’ll be denounced from the briefing room as tools of Putin.
Strangely enough, in this same monologue bashing reporters who rely on Pentagon sources, Carlson cited a Pentagon official in an attempt to support his claim that Ukraine is making bioweapons. Unfortunately for Carlson, the official actually said the exact opposite.
Watch above via Fox News.
