The White House slammed Tucker Carlson on Wednesday for spreading falsehoods about the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riots — joining a growing chorus of voices decrying the Fox News host’s efforts to blame the uprising on prime-time shows.
Carlson has been under fire from Democrats, Republican Senate leaders and the Capitol Police Chief after House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) revealed the influence of the far-right host exclusive access to tens of thousands of hours of January 6 surveillance recordings.
Carlson used select footage to blame the attack on none other than a group of supporters of President Donald Trump during a quiet tourist visit to the US Capitol. In fact, Trump suggested his followers violently attack the building in an attempt to keep him in power, and the rioters injured about 140 officers while looking for lawmakers to attack.
A number of Senate Republicans quickly decried Carlson’s misrepresentation of the January 6 event. Sen. Thom Tillis (RN.C.) said the January 6 host’s portrayal was “nonsense,” and Sen. Kevin Cramer (RN.D. ) said today “clearly more than a peaceful protest of some rowdy Scouts.” Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) criticized McCarthy for releasing the video for Carlson, though the House speaker defended the decision on Friday.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made a rare denunciation of Fox News on Friday, saying the network made a “mistake” in showing cherry-picked footage to paint a different reality. McConnell’s comments echoed Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger, who earlier this week called Carlson’s show “misleading and offensive.”
“We agree with the Capitol Police chief and various bipartisan lawmakers in condemning the false portrayal of a brutal and violent attack on our Constitution and the rule of law — which is costing police lives,” White House spokesman Andrew Andrews said. Bates told HuffPost on Wednesday, after Politico published the report.
The White House’s decision to specifically call out Carlson — who has been criticized in the past for spreading misinformation and conspiracy theories about women, people of color and immigrants — points to growing tensions between the Biden administration and conservative cable networks.
In the statement, Bates noted a case in which Fox News lawyers tried to defend Carlson from defamation charges in 2020 by arguing that viewers should not take the host’s comments as fact.
The spokesperson also cited a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News, in which a senior vice president at the network testified that he himself did not consider Carlson’s show a reliable news source.
“We also agree with the lawyers and Fox News executives have now been repeatedly pressed in many courts,” Bates said, “that Tucker Carlson is not to be trusted.”