Tucker Carlson Roasted For Claiming Elon Musk Taking Over Twitter Would Mean ‘Ruling Class is About to Lose Control’

Fox News’s top-rated host, Tucker Carlson, received a bevy of mockery from critics on Wednesday after a chyron from his Tuesday night show went viral.

Carlson’s opening monologue on Tuesday dabbled in regular themes for the show, in which he railed against “elites” and claimed, from one of the largest platforms on cable news, that right-wing voices are being silenced in an effort to end freedom of thought in the U.S.

Throughout the lengthy diatribe, Carlson argued that Elon Musk was being attacked by the forces of suppression in an effort to stop him from championing free speech. Toward the end of his monologue, the screen showed an image of Musk under the banner, “The Left’s Meltdown.” The chyron on the bottom of the screen read, “The Ruling Class is About to Lose Control.”

The argument that the world’s richest man, who has the blessing of Twitter’s founder, was somehow ending “ruling class” control sparked fierce reactions online.

Jane Coaston of the New York Times tweeted a screenshot of the show and wrote, “We need to have a national conversation on what the definition of “ruling class” is.” Coaston then added an image noting Musk was at one point worth $241 billion.

The Atlantic’s Adam Serwer replied to Coaston, “It’s pretty simple. The working class are the millionaires and billionaires who own the companies, and the ruling class are the people who work for them.”

Conservative writer Eddie Scarry, replied to Coaston saying, “This is, really, a fair question, but accompanied by a specious point. A “ruling class” (thousands of people) versus an individual, even if he is among the wealthiest.”

Arieh Kovler replied, “When the Right talks about elites and the ruling class they seem to mean whoever holds *cultural* power, even when the Right itself holds the political, economic and other forms of coercive power.”

Jared Holt noted, “Elon Musk is by definition ruling class. So is Tucker. What they really mean is that they worry people who aren’t part of their political project, which is seemingly the only metric they use to gauge good/bad anymore. You want to know why we’re polarized, start with this drivel.”

Other social media users were quick to note that Carlson himself was raised in privilege by a father who served as a U.S. ambassador and married an heiress. Carlson, during his long media career, has also been a prominent journalist working for CNN, PBS, and MSNBC.

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!