Tucker Carlson Tonight on
Fox News was the highest-rated cable news program at various points from 2021 to 2023.
Tucker Carlson was fired from the show in April 2023 by the network's owner,
Rupert Murdoch, after allegations were made over a toxic work environment on the show's set during the lawsuit
Dominion Voting Systems v. Fox News Network. Weeks later, Carlson announced a live show on
Twitter named
Tucker on Twitter. In December 2023, Carlson launched the "Tucker Carlson Network" website, which hosts various conservative programs such as
Tucker Carlson Uncensored and from other hosts.
The Tucker Carlson Show, a weekly podcast available as audio and video, started in May 2024. At its launch,
Slate wrote that Carlson had diminished popularity and that he was readjusting his brand as a commentator to be more appealing to the
alt-right rather than traditional conservatism.
2024 Darryl Cooper interview The September 3, 2024, episode of
The Tucker Carlson Show was an interview with amateur historian
Darryl Cooper. Without correction or contradiction from Carlson, Cooper made comments that were seen as
Holocaust denial, including saying that the
millions of people who died during the
Holocaust "ended up dead" as if by accident, rather than being systematically killed. Cooper said that
Winston Churchill was the "real villain" of
World War II, rather than
Adolf Hitler. Hitler, he argued, "didn't kill the most people, he didn't commit the most atrocities", and the
Nazi Party had expressed "humanity".
Elon Musk, who owns X, tweeted that the podcast was "very interesting" and "worth watching"; he deleted the tweet later. The interview was condemned by Republican politicians
Liz Cheney and
Mike Lawler, the
Anti-Defamation League, and
White House senior deputy press secretary Andrew Bates. All 24 Democratic
Jewish members of Congress issued a joint statement denouncing the interview.
JD Vance, then the
Republican Party vice presidential candidate in the
2024 U.S. presidential election, was interviewed on
The Tucker Carlson Show three days later. An official for
Vance's campaign said that coming after Cooper was "not ideal timing, [but] it is what it is". When Vance was asked if Carlson should have interviewed Cooper, he replied, "Tucker Carlson isn't affiliated with the campaign. He's going to do what he wants to do".
2025 Ted Cruz interview On the June 18, 2025, episode of
The Tucker Carlson Show, Carlson interviewed Republican U.S. Senator
Ted Cruz, focusing on the prospect of U.S. involvement in the recently commenced
war between Iran and Israel. Carlson and Cruz's conversation was largely seen as contentious, as they disagreed on a number of points—Carlson being against
U.S.-backed regime change in Iran, and Cruz being in favor of it. A clip of Carlson asking Cruz the
population of Iran (around 90 million) to gauge if he was knowledgeable about the subject, went
viral on social media:
2025 Nick Fuentes interview On October 28, 2025, Carlson hosted
white nationalist political commentator
Nick Fuentes.
The Heritage Foundation publicly supported Carlson for having Fuentes onto his podcast; this ignited a debate about antisemitism among conservatives. Republicans including
Ted Cruz and
Mitch McConnell condemned the Heritage Foundation's defense of Carlson.
2026 split with Trump Following the start of U.S.
military intervention against Iran, Carlson would criticize Trump on the show for his handling of the situation in Iran, dismissed concerns about Iranian weapons, and described the conflict as being based on the "lies" and "regional hegemony" desires of Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu, stating "This happened because Israel wanted it to happen. This is Israel’s war. This is not the United States’ war,” “You have that country breaking apart, and what does that mean? Hard to see that as a good thing for the rest of the world,” “The United States didn’t make the decision here. Benjamin Netanyahu did,” “The point is regional hegemony. Really simple," and "Israel wants to control the Middle East.” In a phone interview with Rachael Blade of
The Inner Circle on March 2, 2026, Trump declared that both Carlson and
Megyn Kelly, another right wing commentator who criticized Trump's Iran policy, "aren't MAGA." On March 5, ABC News reporter
Jonathan Karl revealed that Trump stated to him that "Tucker has lost his way,”and “I knew that a long time ago, and he's not MAGA. MAGA is saving our country. MAGA is making our country great again. MAGA is America first, and Tucker is none of those things. And Tucker is really not smart enough to understand that." In response to Trump "throwing him out of
MAGA," Carlson told
Status'
Oliver Darcy that "There are times I get annoyed with Trump, right now definitely included," while also claiming that "but I’ll always love him no matter what he says about me." On March 18, one day after resigning from the Trump Administration, former
National Counterterrorism Center head
Joe Kent would appear on
The Tucker Carlson Show, insisting that Israel influenced U.S. participation in the Iran War. In addition, Kent alleged to Carlson that he learned that right wing American political activist
Charlie Kirk had broken with Israel shortly before his
murder. == Reception ==