| Tucker Carlson Tonight | |
|---|---|
 Logo used from 2016 to 2021 | |
| Also known as | Tucker |
| Genre | Current affairs program |
| Presented by | Tucker Carlson |
| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of seasons | 6 |
| Production | |
| Production locations | Washington, D.C. (primary) Bryant Pond, Maine (primary) Florida (on location) Los Angeles, California (specials) |
| Camera setup | Multi-camera |
| Running time | 60 minutes (with commercials) |
| Original release | |
| Network | Fox News |
| Release | November 14, 2016 (2016-11-14) – April 21, 2023 (2023-04-21) |
Tucker Carlson Tonight is anAmerican conservative[a] talk show andcurrent affairs program hosted by political commentatorTucker Carlson. The show aired onFox News from November 14, 2016, to April 21, 2023, replacingOn the Record hosted byGreta Van Susteren.Tucker Carlson Tonight included political commentary, monologues, interviews, and analysis, sharing some similarities withOn the Record. Guest hosts for the program includedWill Cain,Sean Duffy,Tulsi Gabbard andBrian Kilmeade.
The show is presented in apopulist format.Tucker Carlson Tonight employed a minute-by-minute viewership rating system, a change brought about by Ron Mitchell, the former senior producer forThe O'Reilly Factor. During its run, the show garnered significant attention amid several controversies. In July 2020,Tucker Carlson Tonight became the highest-rated primetime program across all ofcable news; its dominance in the time slot ended only after the program's abrupt cancellation.[6]
On April 24, 2023, Fox News announced that Tucker Carlson had departed the network. The timeslot was rebranded asFox News Tonight and filled by an interim rotation of personalities. In response, Carlson announced an intent to create a show onTwitter;Tucker on Twitter released its first episode in June. He also released his podcast,The Tucker Carlson Show, in May. On July 17,Jesse Watters Primetime took the place of Carlson's former timeslot.
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Carlson dedicates the opening segment ofTucker Carlson Tonight to topical culture issues andeconomic populism.[7] Opening segments have focused on a debunked story thatNashville mayorJohn Cooper concealedCOVID-19 case numbers[8] and an April 2017 poll showing a larger margin of victory forDonald Trump againstHillary Clinton while mocking the2017 Women's March in January.[9] During his visit toBudapest, Hungary in August 2021, Carlson openedTucker Carlson Tonight by supporting the premiership of Hungarian prime ministerViktor Orbán.[10] Carlson's final opening segment combined theGreat Replacement conspiracy theory with—among other things—FICO scores,home appraisals, theUnited States Department of Housing and Urban Development, vice presidentKamala Harris, andmarijuana legalization, of a backdrop over the failures of a cult;[11] the Great Replacement was also referenced in an April 2021 taping of the show.[12] The length of these opening segments has steadily increased since 2019.[13]
Carlson's monologue is followed by one or several main stories.Tucker Carlson Tonight originally focused on less consequential cultural issues, such as a new line ofhijabs fromMacy's or an influx ofRomani refugees inCalifornia, Pennsylvania.[14] With more executive control, executive producer Ron Mitchell implemented minute-by-minute viewership ratings from the show's previous quarter-hour viewership ratings.Tucker Carlson Tonight began shifting from lighter segments to heavier topics, and overviewedTrumpism rather thanDonald Trump himself, frequently criticizing the former president for deviating from campaign promises, such as expanding theMexico–United States barrier. In opposition to many Fox colleagues, Carlson criticized theassassination of Qasem Soleimani in January 2020 by the Trump administration.[15][16]
Carlson's segments are frequently presented in apopulist format, antagonistic towards several notable politicians, executives, and other figures, such as formerNational Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases directorAnthony Fauci, former speaker of the HouseNancy Pelosi, Hungarian-American businessmanGeorge Soros, and former Republican representativeLiz Cheney. TheRussian invasion of Ukraine prompted an episode in which Carlson presented Russian presidentVladimir Putin as an ally through the use of rhetorical questions. Carlson extensively references theGreat Replacement conspiracy theory, connecting it to the aforementioned "ruling class".[13] During theDominion Voting Systems v. Fox News Network lawsuit, memos by Fox News vice presidentRaj Shah were unveiled which showed the network announcing that the anchors ofTucker Carlson Tonight were to immediately label "any and all" policy announcements by presidentJoe Biden as "socialism", writing that framing such announcements associalism from anAlexandria Ocasio-Cortez andBernie Sanders playbook would likely "animate [Carlson]'s core audience".[17]
Tucker Carlson Tonight occasionally featured a segment sometimes entitled, "Campus Craziness", displaying professors and students at college campuses—a frequent topic on Fox News andBlake Neff's specialty atThe Daily Caller. Such segments involved professors being shunned for criticizingIslam or expressing apparent hatred for white people, and—in one episode—students inMississippi who mistook a banana peel for a hate crime. One segment, "Top This", found Carlson courting quips at video clips of outraged people, a tactic used byBill O'Reilly onThe O'Reilly Factor.[18] Other segments included "Tucker Takes On"—in which Carlson debates aliberal counterpart and described by executives as "Twitter for television", "The Friend Zone"—promoting other Fox News colleagues or friends of Carlson, the "Final Exam"—a trivia game where two guests compete to answer questions relating to recent headlines,[19] and "King for the Day"—a segment where Twitter users could suggest one thing they would change if they were the president.[14]
Tucker Carlson Tonight was broadcast fromBryant Pond, Maine and, occasionally,Florida;[14] in January 2017, it was reported thatTucker Carlson Tonight was broadcast fromFox News' bureau inWashington, D.C.[20] In March 2019, theSun Journal reported on potential plans for Carlson to use an old town garage beside the Whitman Memorial Library in Bryant Pond as a studio that could potentially host an audience. Carlson, who has spent many of his summers atLake Christopher, sent the town a letter in December 2018 offering to purchase the garage forUS$30,000. The deal was abandoned after theSun Journal's article,[21] but residents agreed to sell Carlson the garage regardless in November 2019.[22] Construction began on the studio in May 2020 usingUS$88,000 of Carlson's own money according to documents submitted to the town.[23]
Carlson began each morning by writing his monologue, telling conservative political commentatorDave Rubin onThe Rubin Report that he sends his staff—comprising two dozen employees overseen by senior executive producer Justin Wells—a memo with his lead story and guests he would like to book.Tucker Carlson Tonight's producers would then scour severalright-wing websites, such asBreitbart News andThe Federalist. Early on in the show's production, stories would be sent to a team formed by then-CEORoger Ailes, who suggested that Carlson's producers abstain from using sources such as theneo-Nazi forumStormfront. Carlson's producers began progressively submitting less and less stories to Ailes' team.[24] In March 2017, it was reported that the show's producers allegedly contacted moderators of a Tucker Carlsonsubreddit to solicit suggestions, which was then posted on the pro-Trump subredditr/The_Donald.[25]
In May 2016, amid asexual harassment lawsuit filed by former Fox News anchorGretchen Carlson, then-CEORoger Ailes resigned.[26] Ailes' resignation set the stage for Tucker Carlson, who was well-liked by theMurdochs; Tucker had been a regular on the weekend edition ofFox & Friends. In contrast, Ailes told him that Fox News was "his last chance" at network television.Greta Van Susteren's resignation allowedTucker Carlson Tonight to occupyOn the Record's time slot.[27] The show premiered as a 7:00 p.m.ET program in Fox News's lineup on November 14, 2016.[28][14] The program's premiere episode attracted 3.7 million viewers[29] and was rated higher than previous editions ofOn the Record.[28]
FollowingMegyn Kelly's departure from Fox News, the network announced on January 5, 2017, thatTucker Carlson Tonight would take over the 9:00 p.m. ET time slot vacated byThe Kelly File beginning on January 9, 2017.[20]Martha MacCallum was named as his replacement in the 7:00 p.m. timeslot, with her show carrying the titleThe First 100 Days.[30]Tucker Carlson Tonight switched time slots once again to 9 p.m. ET whenBill O'Reilly ofThe O'Reilly Factor was let go following allegations of sexual misconduct.[14] In June 2017, Ron Mitchell was named the vice president of story development at Fox News after serving as the senior producer ofThe O'Reilly Factor until its cancellation in April 2017.[31]
Throughout 2018 and 2019, the show was the target of anadvertiser boycott. Advertisers began leaving the show after complaints following Carlson saying thatU.S. immigration made the country "poorer, dirtier and more divided." According to Fox News, the advertisers only moved their ad buys to other segments.[32] By early 2019, it was reported the show had lost at least 26 advertisers,[33][34] and by August 2019,Media Matters calculated that the show had lost more than 70 advertisers since December 2018.[35][36] By late September 2019, almost 50 advertisers had released statements announcing the discontinuation of advertising on the show; according toThe Guardian, "dozens more cut ties without saying anything publicly."[37] Despite these boycotts, the average cost for a30-second spot onTucker Carlson Tonight nearly doubled from 2018 to 2019, according to the advertising analytics company SQAD.[38]
In spite of advertiser boycotts,Tucker Carlson Tonight became the second-highest rated news show in all of primetime in October 2018 with 3.2 million nightly viewers, afterHannity.[39] In April 2020, Carlson's program surpassedHannity as the highest-rated primetime cable news show, with an average audience of 4.56 million viewers.[40] During the second quarter of 2020,Tucker Carlson Tonight garnered an average audience of 4.33 million viewers, the largest for any program in the history of cable news.[41][42] In July 2020,Tucker Carlson Tonight broke the record for highest-rated program in U.S. cable news history, garnering an average nightly audience of 4.33 million viewers.[43] In February 2022,Mediaite reported that "in the month of October, Tucker Carlson [was] the number-one watched host among Democrats".[44]
In June 2020, Carlson's on-air criticisms of theBlack Lives Matter movement led corporations such asThe Walt Disney Company,T-Mobile,Papa John's, andPoshmark to pull advertising from his program. A data firm estimated that nearly 38% of Carlson's 2020 advertising revenue had come fromMy Pillow at half-year. Carlson remained the most-watched cable news host, garnering 680,000 viewers among audience members 25-54.[45] These advertisers had not entirely pulled away from Fox News, according to the television network, but only from Carlson's show.[46]Blake Neff, aSouth Dakota resident who worked for Carlson's publicationThe Daily Caller, served as the head writer forTucker Carlson Tonight until July 2020, when he was found to have posted racist comments on the largely unmoderated law school message boardAutoAdmit under the username "CharlesXII"; the username is an apparent reference toCharles XII of Sweden, who, like Neff, abstained from sex and alcohol.[47]
A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington. A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living shit out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It's not how white men fight.
On April 24, 2023, Fox News announced that Carlson had "agreed to part ways" with the network. A reason was not provided for his departure, leading to speculation that it was related to either internal criticism of Fox News leadership, a March 2023 lawsuit filed against Carlson by a senior producer alleging ananti-Semitic andmisogynist workplace culture among its staff, or Fox's settlement of alawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems. The timeslot was temporarily hosted by a rotation of Fox News personalities under the titleFox News Tonight;[49][50][51]Brian Kilmeade hosted the first two nights following Carlson's exit.[52] A document revealed in the lawsuit following theJanuary 6 Capitol attack, wherein Carlson stated that a group of Trump supporters attacking anantifa supporter was "not how white men fight", alarmed several Fox News executives.[48] Carlson signaled his intent to return to television by January 2025, when his current contract with Fox News expires.[53] Speaking toRussell Brand months later, he claimed that Fox News did not tell him the reason for his departure.[54]
Following Carlson's departure from the network, former viewers criticized the decision to use Kilmeade as an interim host, with strong negative reactions being shared by many on social media. Criticisms ranged from Kilmeade's hosting to the decision to fire Carlson.[55][56] Fox News Channel's ratings in the 8 p.m. hour fell dramatically; on April 24, 2023, while the premiere ofFox News Tonight still finished first overall with 2.6 million viewers—a 21% decrease over the average viewership ofTucker Carlson Tonight—it was beaten in thekey demographic by aBill Clinton interview special hosted byJoe Scarborough onMSNBC.[57] Some ofNewsmax TV's primetime programs also saw a notable increase in audience, boosted by one of its programs featuring an interview withDonald Trump hosted byGreg Kelly that night.[58][59] On April 25, Fox's ratings fell further, being barely overtaken by MSNBC'sAll In with Chris Hayes. The timeslot lost approximately half of the viewers it retained as of April 26.[6]
After his dismissal, Carlson announced an intent to produce aweb series as a successor toTucker Carlson Tonight, which would be hosted on hisTwitter account; the first episode of the show,Tucker on Twitter, was released on June 6, 2023.[60][61] On June 12,Axios reported that Fox News had sent acease and desist letter to Carlson, alleging that despite the cancellation of his show, Carlson was still under an exclusive contract with the channel through the end of 2024.[62] In May 2023,Drudge Report reported that Fox News was investigating the possibility of movingHannity up into Carlson's former time slot, and movingJesse Watters Primetime andGutfeld! to the 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. hours respectively.[63] On June 26, 2023, Fox News announced thatJesse Watters Primetime would move up into the formerTucker Carlson Tonight timeslot beginning July 17, withThe Ingraham Angle moving to 7 p.m.Gutfeld! to 10 p.m., andFox News @ Night to 11 p.m.[64] In May 2024, Carlson launched the podcastThe Tucker Carlson Show.[65]
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Carlson's rhetoric—particularly its connection with theGreat Replacement conspiracy theory—has attracted controversy from conservative and liberal figures. In 2018, former editor-at-large ofThe Weekly Standard andneoconservative punditBill Kristol described the views Carlson expressed on his show as "ethno-nationalism of some kind."[66] Carlson responded that Kristol "discredited himself years ago."[67] In March 2022, during theRussian invasion of Ukraine,Los Angeles Times opinion columnist Jackie Calmes criticized Carlson for his coverage of the invasion which she considered to be biased in favor of Russian presidentVladimir Putin and theKremlin.[68] The2022 Buffalo shooting, whose perpetrator voiced support for the conspiracy theory, brought renewed attention to Carlson's claims.[4]
Carlson has called theremoval of Confederate monuments and memorials the "destruction of America's delicate social fabric" andAustria the next "caliphate ofWest Arabia". An episode in which Carlson described themurder of white farmers inSouth Africa—a predominantly black country—as a "white genocide" was a point of contention among Fox News employees. Despite being informed of the story's ties to theneo-Nazi message boardThe Daily Stormer byFox Business president Brian Jones, Fox News vice president Tom Lowell defended the story, with Carlson's continuous coverage reaching Trump.[14] These viewpoints were furthered by Fox News founderRupert Murdoch's eldest son andFox Corporation CEOLachlan Murdoch, who showed sympathy towards Carlson.[69]
In November 2020, the show broadcast a segment about alleged voter fraud inGeorgia during the2020 presidential election. The piece featured the story of aWorld War II veteran named James Blalock ofCovington, Georgia, who died in 2006; Carlson claimed that Blalock voted in the election. Reporting by local news outlets in Georgia later confirmed that Blalock did not vote in the 2020 election, but that his widow had cast a legal vote under the name "Mrs. James E. Blalock, Jr", later confirmed by interviews with Blalock's widow herself.[70] A day later, Carlson issued an on-air correction, stating that "we're always going to correct when we're wrong."[71] Later that month, Carlson criticized unfounded claims made by former federal prosecutorSidney Powell, who alleged thatVenezuela,Cuba and unidentifiedcommunist interests had used a secret algorithm to hack intovoting machines andcommit electoral fraud in the 2020 election. Carlson noted that Powell's claims would be the "single greatest crime in American history", and claimed Powell became "angry and told us to stop contacting her" when he asked for evidence of such fraud. In response,James Golden, the producer ofThe Rush Limbaugh Show, rebuked Carlson.[72]
In July 2020, after combat veteran and senatorTammy Duckworth called for a "national dialogue" about theremoval of monuments toFounding Fathers such asGeorge Washington—whoowned slaves—Carlson received backlash after referring to her as a "moron" and, after she refused to appear on his show absent an apology, a "coward". Carlson's comment that "she was once injured while serving in theIllinois National Guard" was criticized, and he was accused of trivializing her military service; Duckworth lost both of her legs while serving inIraq.[73]
In a September 2018 episode ofTucker Carlson Tonight, Carlson coined the nickname "creepy porn lawyer" to refer toMichael Avenatti, ostensibly in reference to the latter's representingStormy Daniels,[74] which Avenatti objected to and reportedly found infuriating.[75] Following on and off-air sparring between Carlson and Avenatti, the latter announced that he was investigating an alleged bar altercation involving Carlson and a patron.[76] This culminated in the revelation that Carlson had thrown a glass of wine at a man who had insulted his daughter.[76] A July 2019 book by author Peter D'Abrosca made reference to the incident.[77]
In December 2019,Playboy modelKaren McDougal sued Fox News after Carlson used his show to accuse her ofextorting PresidentDonald Trump. In September 2020, a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit, citing Fox News' defense that Carlson's extortion claims were opinion-based and not "statements of fact". The judge also agreed with Fox News' defense that reasonable viewers would have "skepticism" over statements Carlson makes on its show, as he often engages in exaggeration and "non-literal commentary".[78]
In May 2023, footage surfaced online of Carlson making disparaging off-air comments about women—such as calling one "yummy" and asking a female makeup artist if women have "pillow fights" in the restroom—first published by the organizationMedia Matters for America. Other clips show Carlson calling aDominion Voting Systems lawyer a "slimy little motherfucker", criticizing the streaming serviceFox Nation, and discussing sex with British journalistPiers Morgan.[79] In response, Fox News sent acease-and-desist letter to the organization.[80]