‘It’s About Ratings’: Former Fox News Reporter Torches Tucker Carlson For Vaccine ‘Propaganda’

Former Fox News reporter Carl Cameron torched the network for pushing anti-vaccine “propaganda” in an appearance on CNN Monday.

Cameron, who was a political correspondent at Fox for two decades, appeared on CNN morning show New Day — as a growing chorus blames the declining demand for vaccines on conservative media.

“Tucker Carlson is one of many in the right-wing media casting doubt on life-saving Covid vaccines, even as unvaccinated Americans continue to drive up Covid numbers,” said New Day host Brianna Keilar, before asking Cameron: “Why are hosts like Tucker Carlson doing this?”

“It’s about ratings,” Cameron said. “And ratings ultimately become revenue. And that’s the name of the game. Whoever gets the most clicks on social media gets the most money, gets the most fame, gets the most attention. And that type of activity is not journalism. It’s not news. It’s gaslighting. It’s propaganda.”

Cameron noted new infections are climbing in the United States, and overwhelmingly affecting the unvaccinated.

“Anyone who disputes that kind of stuff is putting people’s lives at risk and potentially killing them,” he said.

While many on Fox News have encouraged viewers to get inoculated from Covid-19, Tucker Carlson has hosted vaccine conspiracy theorists on his show and repeatedly attacked the vaccines, often with arguments that are completely wrong.

Cameron continued that “it makes no sense whatsoever” for Fox News to put its the lives of its viewers at risk. “This is literally the metaphor of the lemmings running to their own slaughter,” he said. He added that pro-Trump news outlets like Newsmax and OANN are also guilty of vaccine misinformation.

While research has found Republicans and Fox News viewers are more vaccine-hesitant than other Americans, a recent survey from FiveThirtyEight did find that the Fox audience is more likely to have received a Covid-19 vaccine than viewers of more fringe right wing outlets like Newsmax and OANN.

“These are all cable channels that are perpetuating lies,” Cameron said.

Cameron served as senior political correspondent for Fox News before he left in 2017. When explaining his departure, Cameron cited the election of President Donald Trump and said “the opinion hosts in prime-time and elsewhere on Fox had become more than I could stand.”

When Cameron criticized the direction of his former network in 2019, Fox News issued an innuendo-laden statement trashing him: “Carl Cameron left the network because he was no longer able to show up to work each day – he has a very short memory for our endless compassion, patience and graciousness in dealing with his multitude of personal struggles.”

Watch above, via CNN.