The Megyn Kelly Show - Tucker Carlson Exits Fox News, Don Lemon Fired by CNN, with Glenn Beck, Glenn Greenwald, Rich Lowry, and Steve Krakauer ｜ Ep. 535

00:00:00.460 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.

00:00:12.100 Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show.

00:00:15.660 Absolute bombshell in the media world.

00:00:19.220 Tucker Carlson is no longer a host with Fox News Channel.

00:00:22.860 Fox News releasing a statement moments ago saying the two sides have, quote, agreed to part ways.

00:00:27.860 Uh, Tucker apparently not even coming back to air a goodbye show.

00:00:33.520 His final show was last Friday.

00:00:37.040 In a minute, I'm going to bring in our executive producer on this show, Steve Krakauer, who's also a media analyst and has been for some time.

00:00:44.460 He's been on Tucker's show many times as well.

00:00:46.260 And we'll, we'll get to some analysis for you, but I want to start by sharing my thoughts.

00:00:52.060 Um, this is a terrible move by Fox and it's a great thing for Tucker Carlson.

00:00:58.700 Um, I don't know what drove Fox News to make this decision.

00:01:02.000 And it was clearly Fox News' decision because they're not letting him say goodbye.

00:01:06.120 That's my supposition.

00:01:07.700 That's not inside knowledge.

00:01:09.240 Uh, but this, the, the irony here is that how did they get in trouble with Dominion?

00:01:16.160 They called Arizona too soon, felt their critics.

00:01:19.980 And ultimately that proved to be the case.

00:01:22.180 They were under pressure by their audience to reverse the call.

00:01:26.140 The audience started to leave them in droves because they felt betrayed.

00:01:29.400 Like they didn't understand the mission of Fox News, which is to be fair to, especially the Republicans who don't get a fair shake on other channels.

00:01:36.660 And they went into a panic as their audience started to flee.

00:01:39.360 Then they overcorrected by covering the bullshit claims about Dominion as though they were plausible and gave way too much credence to some of those claims.

00:01:51.280 Then they got sued and last week they settled that case for about $800 million.

00:01:57.000 Tucker Carlson had very little to do with that case.

00:01:59.360 Tucker Carlson was one of the few who went on the air and said, Sidney Powell is a liar.

00:02:03.640 She's a liar. 0.97

00:02:04.260 And I've seen the proof and don't believe her.

00:02:06.580 He was not, he was not the reason for that $800 million settlement.

00:02:11.800 Um, so what do they do now in the wake of that settlement?

00:02:15.640 They get rid of Tucker.

00:02:18.120 Talk about misjudging your audience yet again, yet again, because trust me, I hear from the Fox News audience all the time with whom I still have great relationships.

00:02:28.720 Many, many, many viewers are now my fans on this show.

00:02:32.080 And he's the only reason they watch a lot of them.

00:02:35.860 Tucker's the only reason a lot of people still watch Fox News with respect to my other colleagues there.

00:02:39.980 I'm saying he's their favorite.

00:02:42.160 Um, again, this is speculation.

00:02:44.180 I don't know the actual circumstances, but the fact that he said this on Friday night before he signed off suggests to me this was a management decision.

00:02:53.000 Listen, you're right.

00:02:54.060 It is a disgusting order, but I have no shame.

00:02:56.420 I'm going to go meet.

00:02:57.320 Oh, there they are.

00:02:59.600 We just thought what a great way to end the week.

00:03:01.420 Yeah, truly.

00:03:02.180 That was a great segment.

00:03:03.460 And I'm just grateful that you came on.

00:03:05.300 And I'm especially grateful for the pie.

00:03:06.780 Thank you for having me.

00:03:07.860 Appreciate it.

00:03:08.600 Employee of the week.

00:03:09.500 We're going to just make it of the year.

00:03:11.000 Tyler Morrell of Coco's Pizza.

00:03:12.820 That's it for us for the week.

00:03:14.840 We'll be back.

00:03:16.900 And he wasn't.

00:03:17.460 And I can speak from personal experience on this because Fox News, when I left, asked me to stay.

00:03:24.980 Of course, it's been publicly reported.

00:03:26.820 It made me a very generous offer.

00:03:28.520 But in the end, I wanted to leave.

00:03:30.900 I wanted to raise my own family and working in the prime time just didn't allow that.

00:03:35.740 And that wound up being a good thing for me.

00:03:38.700 Not necessarily the NBC part, but getting out and not having that schedule worked out very well for me.

00:03:43.400 But even understanding that I was leaving the network and that I was quitting, basically, they let me say goodbye to the audience.

00:03:52.620 They did not say, get out.

00:03:56.180 I think this is a massive error.

00:03:58.340 I think this is a massive misjudgment of what their audience wants.

00:04:02.260 If you are, if this is a reaction to the Dominion lawsuit, why is Maria Bartiromo there?

00:04:06.720 Why is Janine Pirro still there? 1.00

00:04:08.460 Why is Suzanne Scott still there, the CEO of Fox News? 1.00

00:04:12.880 She got them in far more trouble with her executive emails panicking about Dominion and the audience than anything Tucker did behind the scenes.

00:04:21.100 I realize the left hates Tucker's guts.

00:04:24.920 I get that this is a joyful day for them.

00:04:27.400 But internally at Fox, they always had that gauge, at least under Roger Ailes, of how to ignore those critics and do what was right for the channel and its audience and the truth.

00:04:38.920 And they lost that in the context of Dominion, as we've discussed on this program many times.

00:04:43.400 But that was not due to anything Tucker did.

00:04:46.780 Yes, there were a couple of controversial emails.

00:04:48.400 We've discussed those at length.

00:04:49.400 Go back and look at my Dominion shows.

00:04:51.480 I've spared no one.

00:04:53.260 But this is an extraordinary move for a channel that appears to be very worried about its audience.

00:05:00.140 Joining me now is Steve Krakauer, as I point out, the EP of this show since we launched.

00:05:05.320 And no, no critic of Tucker.

00:05:08.120 I mean, you see him clearly, too.

00:05:09.560 You've been on his show.

00:05:10.260 You like him.

00:05:11.640 Your reaction to this news, Steve?

00:05:14.000 Well, it's shocking.

00:05:14.800 I was saying to someone earlier, and I have to say my text messages and direct messages are on fire right now.

00:05:21.040 It's very rare these days in the media world for something to happen and to be a total shock.

00:05:26.800 People get hired and fired, and companies like BuzzFeed News just completely get shut down.

00:05:32.420 And it's not really shocking.

00:05:33.940 I mean, it's surprising, but it's not shocking.

00:05:36.380 This news this morning is a total shock, I have to say.

00:05:40.380 To me, perhaps other people saw it coming in some way, but I have not seen that in any capacity.

00:05:45.740 And as we saw from the clip to end the show on Friday night, I don't think Tucker necessarily anticipated that this would go this way.

00:05:53.320 So I do find it shocking.

00:05:55.620 Look, I've known Tucker for a long time.

00:05:57.060 I first interviewed him in 2008.

00:05:59.620 It was the very first time I spoke with him, met him around that time.

00:06:02.960 I've interviewed him probably five or six times since then and maintained a relationship with him.

00:06:08.380 I've been critical of him in Fourth Watch and other places when I feel like it's warranted.

00:06:12.960 But more often than not, I don't.

00:06:14.460 I think it's one of the best shows that's on Heat and Lose.

00:06:17.280 Yeah, yeah.

00:06:18.100 And I think he's someone that is totally unique in the marketplace.

00:06:20.800 I've described him, Joe Rogan, and you as essentially the three most interesting people in the media.

00:06:27.740 And I think that that maintains.

00:06:29.020 And I think whatever happens next, we don't know exactly what went down.

00:06:31.700 And I think I'm hearing three different things as potentials.

00:06:34.720 But whatever happens next, he will maintain a space in the media.

00:06:38.020 And I think it'll be very interesting.

00:06:39.820 This will be good for Tucker.

00:06:40.840 This is going to be great for Tucker.

00:06:41.820 I'm not worried about Tucker at all.

00:06:42.960 I predict Tucker goes independent.

00:06:44.700 Tucker launches a podcast or digital show and crushes it, absolutely crushes it.

00:06:49.360 I thought many times if I came directly to podcast from my primetime show in Fox, I mean,

00:06:53.900 it was a different landscape back then, just in 2017.

00:06:56.620 But that would have been the best way to set myself up in the digital world because you

00:06:59.700 take your audience with you immediately.

00:07:01.460 People weren't really doing that back then.

00:07:02.900 But if he does that now, he's going to be better off than he was at Fox.

00:07:07.440 Tucker was in the primetime at Fox News in the post-Roger Ailes era where they weren't

00:07:13.160 paying the stars what they were paying back in the day.

00:07:17.060 You know, Rachel Maddow was reportedly making $30 million a year. 0.99

00:07:19.900 Trust me, that's not what they were paying Tucker Carlson.

00:07:22.200 And he can make huge money in the independent lane as long as he has a fan base, which he

00:07:27.920 clearly does.

00:07:28.700 And over here in this lane, he doesn't have anybody telling him what he can or cannot

00:07:34.000 say.

00:07:35.300 Right.

00:07:35.700 Right.

00:07:36.000 Yeah.

00:07:36.200 Look, we had Alex Berenson on a few days ago.

00:07:39.180 Alex Berenson does great work.

00:07:41.180 He has a substack.

00:07:42.260 And but Alex Berenson is obviously not Tucker Carlson.

00:07:45.600 But Alex Berenson, if you read the reports, is making millions of dollars a year on his

00:07:49.440 substack.

00:07:50.340 That is that is where the landscape is these days.

00:07:52.900 If you have some a differentiating factor.

00:07:55.620 And again, all due respect to Alex, he's nowhere in the league of Tucker Carlson.

00:07:59.940 So, yes, I think the closest analogy would be like Glenn Beck, who left at the height of

00:08:04.500 his time at Fox and started The Blaze and was originally called GBTV.

00:08:08.460 And as has been reported, you know, got about a couple hundred thousand subscribers to pay

00:08:12.620 a hundred dollars a year and and very quickly became a giant business that was beyond Glenn.

00:08:17.860 And he started a whole company that has maintained to this day.

00:08:20.840 But that's the closest analogy to someone leaving at the absolute height.

00:08:25.240 And even Glenn wasn't at the height, I would say, that Tucker is in the traditional media

00:08:28.560 space.

00:08:29.380 Obviously, Tucker's doing documentaries and long form interviews on Fox Nation as well.

00:08:33.240 So he's got all of these various things in the works and and for it to be a shock.

00:08:37.340 I mean, I'm getting text messages from people who are, I would say, are in the know in the

00:08:41.160 business.

00:08:41.480 And they're just like emojis, just like the shock face emoji.

00:08:45.340 I mean, that's no one saw this coming.

00:08:47.140 And I would just throw out there, Megan, I think there are three camps that I'm hearing

00:08:51.180 from right now.

00:08:51.880 One is, is he is this some sort of way of pushing them out related to Dominion, related

00:08:57.220 to another lawsuit that's going on?

00:08:58.880 I would be shocked.

00:08:59.800 But that's obviously one point of view out there.

00:09:01.560 Is this Tucker being told to do something or not do something and saying, no, and in

00:09:07.480 fact, I'm going to leave because of that?

00:09:09.300 That's certainly a possibility.

00:09:11.160 And then, of course, there's a speculation about about politics, which I also do not think

00:09:15.640 is true, but I've seen that as well.

00:09:17.820 OK, let's talk about those.

00:09:19.640 We'll take them in reverse order.

00:09:20.860 Yes.

00:09:21.160 Somebody say, I think, was it Stephen Miller, Stephen L. Miller tweeted out he's running

00:09:25.320 now.

00:09:25.820 He may have been joking.

00:09:26.700 I don't know.

00:09:27.400 Stephen L. Miller is very funny, so it could have been a tongue in cheek.

00:09:30.460 He's running, but a lot of people think he's going to run for office.

00:09:33.500 I don't think so.

00:09:34.740 I just don't think so.

00:09:35.920 Tucker's got way more influence sitting behind a microphone than he does standing on a debate

00:09:40.140 stage.

00:09:40.580 So who knows?

00:09:41.900 But I've never heard him say he wants to do that.

00:09:44.540 You know, I'm not like one of his besties, but we're friends.

00:09:48.840 The lawsuit.

00:09:49.800 So we talked about the Dominion lawsuit on this show many times.

00:09:52.340 I know we're not going to bore the audience by going back over it.

00:09:54.520 But the highlight on Dominion is Tucker, while he had a couple of texts behind the scenes,

00:09:58.660 which weren't helpful, his texts paled in comparison to those of the executives, their

00:10:06.620 texts and their deposition testimonies.

00:10:09.860 And Tucker's the one who went out on the air and said, Sidney Powell is bullshit.

00:10:14.880 Yeah, exactly.

00:10:16.120 So the Dominion thing doesn't make sense.

00:10:18.120 It doesn't make sense.

00:10:18.940 And for a couple of reasons, like you said, there's that.

00:10:20.720 Also, if you want to say that there was something that came out of the Dominion texts that was

00:10:26.780 embarrassing to Tucker and Fox, it was probably that he really was pretty critical of Donald

00:10:30.920 Trump in a lot of ways.

00:10:32.520 And yet Donald Trump sat down and did the long form interview with Tucker very recently.

00:10:36.700 And so it seems like everything is squashed.

00:10:38.220 In fact, I just listened to Trump on the Full Send podcast over the weekend, and he was again

00:10:42.680 praising Tucker.

00:10:43.520 This was a very recent interview.

00:10:44.760 So I think that whatever bad blood there might have been there is squashed as well.

00:10:48.200 And Fox is anti-Trump these days anyway, so they wouldn't be holding that against Tucker.

00:10:53.360 But the worst thing I saw on Tucker's watch during the Dominion lawsuit was there was

00:10:57.840 an internal text that they had to produce in the lawsuit where he was mad about some

00:11:03.340 reporter, a straight news reporter, I think it was Jackie Henrich, fact-checking Trump claims

00:11:08.860 about Dominion that it aired on Hannity.

00:11:10.960 And he said something like, she should be fired, which was not good.

00:11:14.060 But you and I discussed that too.

00:11:15.320 I'm not going to excuse the text, but I understand it wasn't, oh my God, she offered facts on Fox

00:11:21.720 and should be fired.

00:11:22.520 There's a hard rule at Fox News that you don't shoot inside the tent.

00:11:26.960 And this was her going on and fact-checking Hannity, essentially, which you'd have to

00:11:33.820 clear that with management before you did it as a straight news reporter at Fox News.

00:11:37.800 Of course.

00:11:38.240 Why should you do it as a straight news reporter?

00:11:40.280 That's fact-checking Sean Hannity.

00:11:41.760 That does seem like it makes-there's two things about that that, of course, most of

00:11:45.760 the media ignore.

00:11:46.800 Yes, exactly like you said, it was actually about Sean Hannity, not just about Donald Trump.

00:11:50.880 And Jackie Henrich is still there, still right there in the White House briefing room every

00:11:54.840 day.

00:11:55.120 She's only been promoted since then.

00:11:56.540 So that's not like there is some-like they've been critical of some of the texts, not from

00:12:01.120 Tucker, but from others about Chris Dierwald and Bill Salmon.

00:12:04.100 And then what ended up leading to their departure, Jackie Henrich still remains there.

00:12:07.840 So that had no effect.

00:12:09.180 And the other thing is, look at the Suzanne Scott texts talking about how other reporters

00:12:14.220 like Jillian, I can't remember their names, forgive me, a lot of these people came up

00:12:17.620 to Rise after I left, and I don't watch cable news anymore, but saying like, she needs to

00:12:23.960 be reined in, she doesn't understand what our audience wants. 0.97

00:12:26.880 That was from the CEO of the company.

00:12:28.900 So is Suzanne Scott getting fired? 1.00

00:12:30.460 Because that's really my, we'll get to them, the others, after we finish this Tucker analysis.

00:12:34.820 So I don't believe Dominion was behind, the Dominion settlement.

00:12:38.260 I just don't believe it, especially because Rupert made enough admissions during his deposition

00:12:42.320 to sink the company at the trial without any help from Tucker.

00:12:46.440 So I don't believe Dominion.

00:12:48.000 I don't believe he's running.

00:12:48.900 We're throwing this out in real time, Megan.

00:12:50.160 Let me just throw this at you because I got this from someone.

00:12:52.420 Is there a chance that buried in the settlement is we need some scalps?

00:12:56.840 And that's what Dominion did in order to not have this go to trial.

00:13:01.320 And that may have been one of them.

00:13:01.700 Why would they want Tucker's scalp?

00:13:03.800 They would want Maria's scalp. 0.94

00:13:05.180 They would want Janine Pirro's scalp. 0.84

00:13:06.960 They would want Suzanne Scott's scalp. 1.00

00:13:09.120 Tucker, I mean, yes, there were a couple of comments.

00:13:11.620 The left all hates Tucker.

00:13:13.260 But I just can't imagine a world in which Rupert and Lachlan bow to that kind of pressure.

00:13:20.880 But I could be wrong because there's no way this happened without Rupert's blessing.

00:13:25.040 No way.

00:13:26.620 So he clearly did sign off on losing him, which, again, just makes absolutely no sense to me.

00:13:31.460 So let's talk about the other lawsuit and I'm going to get reaction is pouring in.

00:13:34.880 Now, the the nightmares over at The View will get to them.

00:13:38.580 But the the other lawsuit that you mentioned, Abby Grossberg, is that her name?

00:13:45.280 One.

00:13:45.960 All right.

00:13:46.360 So there's I've seen a speculation, as you have as well, that her lawsuit may have had something

00:13:52.020 to do with this.

00:13:52.780 I reject this fully.

00:13:53.600 But this is let's talk about what the speculation is.

00:13:55.980 She worked for Tucker and she also worked for Maria. 0.98

00:13:59.420 She was a producer who had to turn over her documents and emails and so on during the 1.00

00:14:03.320 Dominion lawsuit.

00:14:04.260 She had been making recordings of some of her discussions, i.e.

00:14:08.140 with Maria and Giuliani that she had on a phone.

00:14:11.340 We also reported this last week or whenever it came out that she then went to the lawyers

00:14:17.080 of Fox and said, you need to produce this in the context of the Dominion lawsuit.

00:14:20.100 It's it's responsive.

00:14:21.400 It's a dead phone, but it has recordings on it.

00:14:23.600 And she says they didn't they they let it lie.

00:14:26.380 And then she quit. 0.85

00:14:27.920 She sued Fox and said, you tried to manipulate my testimony before I went into deposition.

00:14:32.440 You kind of strong armed me into lying to help you.

00:14:35.900 I feel disgusting about the whole thing.

00:14:38.240 Oh, and by the way, here's this phone that's got recordings that are relevant that you didn't

00:14:41.040 turn over.

00:14:41.860 So that's the worst way as a lawyer for Fox to find out that there are recordings of

00:14:45.880 your people that are responsive.

00:14:47.100 But that appears to be what happened.

00:14:48.660 The judge was mad.

00:14:49.400 The judge sanctioned Fox News right before they settled.

00:14:51.800 And this woman's still suing Fox News, claiming that all that happened and also alleging things 1.00

00:14:59.380 like the C word was regularly bandied about in the news pod and on Tucker's team.

00:15:07.200 Look, I can tell you this.

00:15:08.860 And, you know, two of the women who work for me at Fox News work for me right now. 1.00

00:15:12.200 My my like two main producers, Canadian Debbie and Kelly McGuire.

00:15:15.640 They're both with me now.

00:15:16.420 And they they could be fact witnesses on this.

00:15:18.840 When I when shit went down, Roger Ailes got fired.

00:15:21.920 I met with my entire team at the Kelly file and I said, you know, what you're reading in

00:15:26.640 the paper is true.

00:15:28.140 I spoke with Lachlan and I spoke with the investigators and I told the truth about what happened to

00:15:32.560 me years ago.

00:15:33.680 But if this place were some disgusting, misogynistic hellhole, I would not have stayed here.

00:15:40.160 And the narrative people are running with about Fox News and our colleagues because they're

00:15:45.520 enjoying so much this news, they're false that those narratives are lies.

00:15:51.340 This is not a disgusting place to work where people are regularly talking about women like 1.00

00:15:54.780 that and regularly dumping all over women. 0.89

00:15:57.000 Yes, it's happening.

00:15:58.120 And it happened at the very highest levels.

00:15:59.780 But I told them that.

00:16:00.860 And I just I have a very hard time imagining that post Roger Ailes post, you know, my stint

00:16:08.560 in the tenure, Fox took such a hard turn back that they're running around like she's a C

00:16:13.440 and she's a C and that one's a C in the news pods, which are small and everyone can hear

00:16:19.120 they're they're out in the newsroom.

00:16:20.660 I don't believe it.

00:16:21.700 I don't believe that.

00:16:23.140 And I certainly don't believe they would fire Tucker over that allegation.

00:16:27.140 No, there's no way I think that that would lead to his firing.

00:16:31.380 I agree with you.

00:16:31.900 Again, I don't know the ins and outs of it, but I would just say let's just throw out a 1.00

00:16:35.520 hypothetical.

00:16:36.600 What if in reaction to this lawsuit, they made some play that they had to get rid of some

00:16:43.700 lower level person who maybe was doing that some PA or some associate producer and Tucker

00:16:48.760 in defense of that person said, no, that's not happening.

00:16:51.400 This person works for me and they're a good producer.

00:16:53.340 And then it got to this level that, you know, it's either this person or me.

00:16:58.020 And so that's where I wonder if this lawsuit may have played a role in it.

00:17:01.780 Again, a lot of lawsuits going on here.

00:17:04.220 There's Smartmatic that's still here that I think is going to go to trial in 2025.

00:17:08.280 So it's a long way out.

00:17:09.380 Let me jump in before we do Smart.

00:17:11.180 Let's stay on that point and then we'll do Smartmatic.

00:17:14.620 Either way, that's them agreeing to let him go.

00:17:17.420 Like back in my day, they never would have agreed.

00:17:22.420 Like they knew who their top talent was.

00:17:26.040 Bill O'Reilly, we now know, had paid out $69 million in sexual harassment settlements and

00:17:33.920 they kept him.

00:17:35.220 They kept him and they paid him $25 million a year.

00:17:40.660 So they would keep their top talent at any cost if they wanted to.

00:17:46.820 So I don't accept that.

00:17:48.100 This had to be Fox agreeing to let him go.

00:17:51.820 And the reasons why he is Fox News right now.

00:17:56.020 And if they wanted to build up their news division, if they wanted to build back their

00:17:59.260 reputation, right, because he does dominate the opinion and so on.

00:18:02.420 If they want to say, let's get back to being a news organization, then Suzanne Scott needs 1.00

00:18:05.720 to be fired and they need to rehire Chris Steyerwalt and Bill Salmon, who were running

00:18:10.040 the decision desk and were honorable journalists who got the ax for no reason other than the

00:18:15.200 early Arizona call, which was offered by a desk.

00:18:18.680 They didn't even run.

00:18:19.780 Arnon Mishkin runs that desk and he's ultimately the one in charge and he didn't get fired.

00:18:24.140 So why those two?

00:18:25.160 They were the sacrificial lambs.

00:18:28.260 Yeah, and that's why I feel like all these lawsuit things again, I know we now we mentioned

00:18:32.180 Dominion.

00:18:32.580 We've mentioned the Grossberg one.

00:18:34.100 There's Smartmatic and there's other related.

00:18:35.720 And then there's, you know, 60 Minutes did a profile of Ray Epps last night and Ray

00:18:40.280 Epps is sitting there name dropping Tucker Carlson as someone that-

00:18:43.040 Explain who that is.

00:18:44.200 So Ray Epps was the January 6th rioter, I think it's fair to say, who has only been

00:18:51.420 celebrated by the media, a real strange one.

00:18:53.660 This is a former Oath Keeper leader who then left the Oath Keepers, was there on January

00:18:58.920 6th, was the only person on video on January 5th night and January 6th morning encouraging

00:19:03.700 people to go into the Capitol.

00:19:04.920 People were saying fed to him because it was like, why are you telling people to go into

00:19:08.700 the Capitol?

00:19:09.180 We're just here to march and support Trump.

00:19:11.500 And then now has been, he's never been charged with a crime.

00:19:15.320 He was originally on the FBI's website.

00:19:17.200 That was taken down and has spawned conspiracy theorists.

00:19:20.140 I think it's fair to say some of what has been said about Ray Epps, that he is part of

00:19:25.060 the government or part of the FBI, has been clearly not true because I think that that would

00:19:29.500 be able to come out.

00:19:30.360 But it's also a strange story.

00:19:31.780 And at the very least, this is a guy who was encouraging lawlessness on January 6th.

00:19:35.580 And yet he's been favorably profiled in the New York Times multiple times.

00:19:39.140 And then last night, sat for a very nice interview with Bill Whitaker on 60 Minutes, in which he

00:19:43.860 called out Tucker Carlson again and also floated that he may sue Tucker Carlson for defamation.

00:19:48.780 Okay.

00:19:49.320 All right.

00:19:49.720 I get it.

00:19:50.160 I get it.

00:19:50.700 Not it.

00:19:51.500 Not it.

00:19:51.880 Not big enough.

00:19:52.860 Not seismic enough.

00:19:53.900 All these are red.

00:19:54.280 But I will tell you what, I'll tell you what my own theory is.

00:19:58.860 Fox News was facing and is facing right now shareholder lawsuits as a result of the Dominion

00:20:03.880 payout and, you know, the mismanagement of that whole thing.

00:20:07.520 And Fox News is not run entirely by Rupert.

00:20:11.080 Fox News has a board.

00:20:11.920 And, you know, I tweeted out a month ago something to the effect of if Tucker Carlson finds a

00:20:19.640 bunny boiling on his stove, it's 100% the New York Times.

00:20:22.920 You know, it's a fatal attraction reference for us old people.

00:20:27.280 And so I, I, my guess without knowing more is, and again, I, I'm getting ahead of my skis.

00:20:35.000 We could find out that Tucker just said, I don't want to be here anymore and walked out,

00:20:38.160 but it just happened so quickly without a goodbye.

00:20:40.360 That's what I'm basing my supposition on.

00:20:42.760 Um, and the statement that they issued, I think they would have said he left, you know,

00:20:47.120 I think it wouldn't have read the way it did.

00:20:49.740 Um, and I'll read you, I guess I, can you guys resend me the statement from Fox?

00:20:54.020 Cause my, my text chain with my team now is so long.

00:20:56.240 I can't find it.

00:20:57.480 Um, oh my God, there's more breaking news.

00:21:02.260 Steve, check your check your, we have a producer's text chain guys.

00:21:08.620 Oh my God.

00:21:10.360 So there's now breaking news from CNN.

00:21:16.500 Don Lemon's been fired.

00:21:18.580 Don Lemon terminated at CNN.

00:21:20.900 Oh my God.

00:21:21.820 It's a, am I still employed by myself?

00:21:24.480 Are you still, you're still employed, Steve?

00:21:26.160 You're good.

00:21:26.640 You know, I'm really excited for the, uh, Hannity and Combs reboot called, uh, Carlson and Lemon.

00:21:31.940 Um, that's the line of the day right there.

00:21:37.660 That's, that was very clever.

00:21:39.940 Um, all right, wait, this is just to bring you up to speed there.

00:21:44.020 Here's a statement from Don Lemon.

00:21:45.140 I was informed this morning by my agent that I have been terminated by CNN.

00:21:49.120 I am stunned.

00:21:50.240 After 17 years at CNN, I would have thought that someone in management would have had the

00:21:53.940 decency to tell me directly.

00:21:55.120 I got to give Don Lemon that point, frankly.

00:21:58.120 Um, at no time was I ever given any indication that I would not be able to continue to do the

00:22:02.300 work I have loved at the network.

00:22:04.200 It is clear that there are some larger issues at play.

00:22:06.920 With that said, I want to thank my colleagues and the many teams I have worked for, uh, for an

00:22:11.020 incredible run.

00:22:11.900 They are the most talented journalists in the business and I wish them all the best.

00:22:15.980 Good God.

00:22:17.420 That's so that we should know that's, that is a bad breakup in the media business.

00:22:20.860 When, when Don Lemon puts that out, obviously CNN put out their own statement, but notably

00:22:24.820 Tucker Carlson has not spoken publicly about his exit at this point.

00:22:28.600 And certainly not in those terms that Don just did.

00:22:31.540 Uh, that's, that's bad, bad breakup.

00:22:33.140 No, no, he's, he's not wrong.

00:22:35.320 I mean, everybody knows I'm not exactly Don Lemon's fan, but he's not wrong that if that's

00:22:40.500 true, that he was just told by his agent, he was fired and they didn't have the balls

00:22:45.520 to tell him man to man.

00:22:47.220 I mean, that's just classless.

00:22:48.780 He's got a right to complain about that.

00:22:51.460 He was on air this morning.

00:22:52.920 I saw.

00:22:53.880 So, so that's, uh, so that's a, you're escorted out of the building kind of situation.

00:22:59.340 It seems that way.

00:23:01.020 Yeah, this was, that's what they do when they fire you.

00:23:03.140 When they fire you, they, I mean, we saw this at Fox many times, uh, they're very brutal

00:23:08.100 about it.

00:23:08.560 And you, our audience has probably had this in our own companies that you get told you're

00:23:13.040 fired and they have two security guards standing there.

00:23:15.140 They'll see you back to your desk.

00:23:16.500 You have to fill up your box and walk out.

00:23:19.140 It's very humiliating.

00:23:21.420 Something must've happened there.

00:23:22.660 I feel like Steve, something must've happened there.

00:23:24.200 Something else must've come out.

00:23:25.420 So there must've been something like a final straw.

00:23:27.620 I would think so.

00:23:29.300 And it should be noted.

00:23:30.240 I mean, obviously we're reacting to this in real time, but the idea that, that Don Lemon

00:23:33.840 is fired by CNN is not a shock.

00:23:36.280 Um, there's the way this went down perhaps is, but, but there's been a lot of rumblings

00:23:40.760 for, for weeks, for months that this is inevitable.

00:23:43.640 Um, the way that ultimately culminated here, I think maybe perhaps is something that looks

00:23:50.200 good for Don and for his, for the way that he wants to go out in this blaze of glory,

00:23:54.140 which it does seem like, although, you know, it's glory.

00:23:57.420 Yeah.

00:23:57.920 Well, you know, you overstayed the case, sir.

00:24:00.300 Trying to get ahead of the story at least, um, uh, in, in this scenario there and, uh,

00:24:05.160 not giving any sort of a chance for CNN to have the first word out of the gate, um,

00:24:10.420 like Fox did in this situation.

00:24:11.540 Wait, and tell him, Steve, tell him what happened with Karine Jean-Pierre, um, and Don Lemon

00:24:16.400 on Friday.

00:24:17.380 Cause that, that's another piece to this story.

00:24:20.220 Yes.

00:24:20.460 Yeah.

00:24:20.940 Yeah.

00:24:21.200 The, the, the reports are that Karine Jean-Pierre who, uh, has been interviewed by Don Lemon

00:24:25.000 before, uh, refused to be interviewed by Don Lemon when she did an appearance on CNN this

00:24:29.880 morning and would only talk to one of, uh, his female co-anchors, uh, for that, that is

00:24:35.280 based on, at least according to this reporting, Don's comments going a little bit further back

00:24:40.000 about, uh, uh, women in their prime.

00:24:42.300 So, so it's starting to, in theory, at least according to this leaked report, which who knows

00:24:46.640 where that came from affect the editorial side of what happened on that show, Don's

00:24:51.240 mishaps.

00:24:52.840 Hmm.

00:24:53.240 I want to say this, um, we're going to bring Glenn Beck is standing by and I want to get

00:24:57.580 his reaction.

00:24:58.200 We talked about him.

00:24:58.960 He and I, old colleagues at Fox and he left, um, and of course created the blaze, which was

00:25:03.680 a juggernaut and remains.

00:25:05.240 And, um, and then we're going to bring Steve back.

00:25:07.300 But I do want to say this, I, I firmly believe Tucker will be better off.

00:25:11.760 I think these cable networks are dinosaurs.

00:25:15.440 They're dying a slow and painful death before our very eyes.

00:25:18.420 They're not the hot new thing that people are dying to tune into.

00:25:21.740 Yes.

00:25:21.900 When there's breaking news, you want to go and see the car chase or you want to see,

00:25:25.000 you know, what exactly is unfolding before your eyes.

00:25:27.160 But for the most part, I think audiences are turning more and more to platforms that are

00:25:32.760 more user-friendly are available when they want them to be.

00:25:35.580 You can download the Megyn Kelly podcast whenever you want, right?

00:25:38.280 You can get it like when you're, when you're doing your makeup, when you're driving your

00:25:41.300 car, it's just so much more user-friendly.

00:25:44.040 And I think that's why more and more news personalities are gravitating toward these

00:25:48.080 platforms as opposed to just signing up.

00:25:51.060 Trust me, if I wanted to sign up for another cable show, I had so many opportunities after

00:25:55.120 I left NBC.

00:25:55.740 I chose to be here for a reason.

00:25:58.200 This is, this is the future and Tucker knows that.

00:26:01.180 And he's going to be able to come over here with a huge audience and create, this is my

00:26:04.880 speculation.

00:26:05.480 I don't know he's doing that.

00:26:06.340 I'm just saying, um, getting out under the thumb of the big corporate management is a

00:26:12.380 blessing.

00:26:12.920 It is a blessing.

00:26:13.880 And I know he's smart enough to know that.

00:26:16.340 Um, when we come back, Glenn Beck, and then we'll pick it up again on the back end with

00:26:20.700 Steve.

00:26:21.080 Don't go away.

00:26:21.760 What a day.

00:26:25.400 Welcome back to the Megyn Kelly show.

00:26:26.860 Joining me now on the breaking news is Glenn Beck, founder of blaze media, host of the Glenn

00:26:30.480 Beck program.

00:26:31.880 And like yours truly, a former Fox news host, uh, earthquake in the media landscape, Glenn

00:26:38.060 about Tucker and Fox parting ways.

00:26:41.300 Don Lemon's also been terminated from CNN, less of an earthquake.

00:26:45.020 So let's start with the big news.

00:26:47.100 It's not even a tremor.

00:26:48.900 Um, okay.

00:26:49.760 So Don Lemon, let's just dismiss.

00:26:51.840 I think it's a great timing, uh, for CNN because no one's going to talk about Don Lemon

00:26:56.960 and he'll just be gone and nobody will even realize it.

00:26:59.180 Uh, and you know, so all those celebrations will be missed too.

00:27:02.720 Um, when it comes to, uh, Tucker, this is phenomenal.

00:27:07.940 I was trying to think of anyone that has left at the absolute pinnacle of their, uh, of their

00:27:19.760 ratings.

00:27:21.000 And I can't think of anyone on cable news who I did.

00:27:26.960 Oh yeah, you, yeah, that's right.

00:27:29.340 You did.

00:27:30.060 Yep.

00:27:30.340 You're right.

00:27:30.880 My show is number one in the key advertising demo.

00:27:33.300 No, no, you're right.

00:27:34.500 You're right.

00:27:35.160 I was remembering that differently.

00:27:37.200 I've, I, my apologies.

00:27:39.300 No, no.

00:27:39.820 Um, yeah.

00:27:41.060 Um, so I mean, you, you did too, like you and you Fox parted ways.

00:27:45.900 You were on fire.

00:27:47.480 There wasn't a more relevant voice in cable.

00:27:50.200 So it's happened, but Tucker is in a unique position with all due respect to you and to me.

00:27:54.860 Tucker right now is extremely powerful.

00:27:57.920 His voice, the politicians bow to him.

00:28:01.040 They, they, they look for his approval.

00:28:02.620 I mean, he's just at a different level.

00:28:04.360 You know, when we were there, you, we had you, Bill, me, uh, and we had people that were,

00:28:11.480 were following stories, especially the two of us.

00:28:14.320 We would, um, delve into things that made people uncomfortable like Tucker does.

00:28:20.380 They, Tucker's the only one there now that I think actually is, um, really exploring and

00:28:27.600 looking for the truth.

00:28:29.380 He may not get it right all the time, but he is, uh, certainly a lone voice in the wilderness.

00:28:35.480 And I think this is really going to hurt, uh, Fox, but I, I, I tell you, I'd love to hear

00:28:41.400 your thoughts on this.

00:28:42.240 I think between the AOC statement that came out over the weekend, uh, that, you know, Fox

00:28:48.760 should be regulated, the billion dollar lawsuit, and more importantly, CBS in this insane interview 0.64

00:28:55.980 with Ray Epps, where Ray Epps specifically said, uh, Tucker Carlson is targeting me to

00:29:03.120 destroy my life.

00:29:04.500 I think those, those three things happening within seven days is not a coincidence.

00:29:11.660 I, I don't, I just think the Murdochs, if nothing else have very, very steely spines.

00:29:20.300 I mean, the New York times did a front page piece on Tucker Carlson and what a racist he

00:29:25.480 allegedly is.

00:29:26.440 And then every two minutes retweets it on their Twitter feed that they have tried so

00:29:31.480 hard to take him down and they just, no, you know, the rumors, no, no, they don't listen

00:29:35.720 to the New York times.

00:29:36.540 The dominion lawsuit was not about Tucker.

00:29:39.460 If anything, why isn't Maria fired? 1.00

00:29:41.540 Why isn't Janine Pirro fired? 1.00

00:29:42.960 Why isn't Suzanne Scott fired? 1.00

00:29:44.260 If it were about dominion, it can't be that this is about dominion.

00:29:47.940 I mean, maybe, maybe they know something we don't know, very possible, but it doesn't

00:29:51.200 make sense to me.

00:29:51.900 So, uh, so what do you, what do you think is happening here?

00:29:56.660 I think shareholders, I think the board, I think they were rattled by the left's coverage

00:30:02.080 of dominion.

00:30:02.680 Because if you were to read the left's coverage of dominion, it is Tucker's fault.

00:30:07.460 Which is, which goes right to the left's plan.

00:30:10.140 And here's what I, I think, um, Megan, it is not like when you and I left, there wasn't

00:30:17.740 this system that we have now online.

00:30:21.320 I mean, I left and there were, you created it.

00:30:23.800 Well, you and our guest who we were going to have on Adam Curry today, but we'll move

00:30:27.080 him to another, but yeah, you were, you were really a pioneer in the space.

00:30:31.460 He was the pioneer and you were one as well.

00:30:33.140 Yeah.

00:30:33.800 Well, we, we put the first network on the air, which is that never been done in it.

00:30:38.140 I mean, I learned a lot of lessons and it costs a lot of money.

00:30:42.140 Um, but we have, you know, we have it down now.

00:30:45.060 And I think people can see that it's not like you're prospecting anymore.

00:30:50.520 You can leave and come to online and have total freedom, total freedom, uh, and make more

00:31:00.940 money, have a better life and a better connection, uh, with people.

00:31:06.460 And you're, you're not that face that, uh, where everybody lines up to punch you in the

00:31:13.460 face like Tucker was, he was the number one punching bag.

00:31:17.560 His, I mean, his family had been threatened.

00:31:20.120 We covered the, the actual, you know, protest.

00:31:23.600 I can't find a better word.

00:31:24.560 It wasn't a full riot, but just incursion on his property at his home with his wife inside.

00:31:30.940 Um, he constantly with the death threats and the armed guards.

00:31:34.520 I mean, he he's, you know, being approached in every store being, they, they made him truly.

00:31:40.040 They said that Larry Elder was the black face of white supremacy.

00:31:42.660 They made Tucker the white face of white supremacy.

00:31:44.860 They made him into David Duke, which is a lie.

00:31:47.140 It's a lie.

00:31:47.820 It's based mostly on the whole replacement theory, which is basically just Tucker saying

00:31:51.560 there's a reason they want all these immigrants coming across the border and it's to make 1.00

00:31:55.160 them into future voters.

00:31:56.140 It wasn't, we're getting rid of the whites. 1.00

00:31:58.020 That was not it.

00:31:58.900 It's not, it's not.

00:32:00.160 And you know, he is, he was alone though, um, at Fox with the videos.

00:32:05.860 Did you notice that the news department never played any of those videos?

00:32:11.600 Yes, we talked about this.

00:32:13.720 They didn't support him at all.

00:32:14.940 They buried their own exclusive.

00:32:16.860 Correct.

00:32:17.980 It was all him.

00:32:19.560 They didn't.

00:32:20.440 I mean, Megan, in your wildest dreams, you have access to tapes.

00:32:26.040 He's showing you the tapes.

00:32:27.820 You could verify that the tapes are real because you know where the source and everything.

00:32:31.520 Why would you not cover that?

00:32:33.160 That's not news.

00:32:34.520 Because I think Fox is in real, real trouble, real trouble.

00:32:39.440 The only thing, the only thing I would say is I don't think this would do it.

00:32:45.740 I mean, outside of my theory about the board and the shareholders, um, if there's another

00:32:50.940 major talent that you find out just re-upped their deal at some astronomical number, that

00:32:59.600 person could potentially, I don't know.

00:33:01.180 I mean, they could have said he goes or I go, but I don't think there's not another

00:33:04.500 bigger star at Fox, but there are bigger money makers because advertisers weren't going on

00:33:09.920 his show.

00:33:10.760 The way that this was, uh, couched though, it is mutual yada yada.

00:33:16.380 I could see a scenario where they said, look, you're not going to do this, this, and this

00:33:22.800 anymore because our tolerance level is very, very low.

00:33:26.400 We're not going to get sued, blah, blah, blah.

00:33:28.600 And he said, I'm not doing that.

00:33:30.600 And they weren't, they weren't so sad to see him go.

00:33:34.020 And he wasn't so sad to leave.

00:33:36.480 I could see that.

00:33:38.160 Very possible.

00:33:38.980 Um, I will read the, the Fox news statement.

00:33:41.380 So people get the flavor, uh, Fox news media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways

00:33:46.900 have agreed to part ways.

00:33:48.720 We thank him for his service to the network as a host.

00:33:51.020 And prior to that, as a contributor, Mr. Carlson's last program was Friday, April 21st.

00:33:55.320 Fox news tonight will air live at 8 PM starting this evening as an interim show helmed by rotating

00:34:00.600 Fox news personalities until a new host is named.

00:34:02.520 That's just how they always do it.

00:34:03.820 Fox news media, blah, blah, blah.

00:34:05.040 That's that.

00:34:05.460 The rest is just about how big boxes and who they, how many people.

00:34:08.120 I mean, uh, you know, they love to throw grenades at former talent.

00:34:13.800 They love to do that.

00:34:16.040 There, there is a, there was some sort of an agreement here, but they didn't fire him.

00:34:21.600 Uh, and I don't think he just walked on them.

00:34:25.520 I think there was a mutual understanding that some, some new barrier was put up, I think.

00:34:31.720 Well, I mean, I, I don't, we can quibble over the word fire, but there is, I don't think

00:34:36.520 Tucker just walked in the middle of his deal.

00:34:39.300 No, no, no, no, no.

00:34:40.400 It would have had, they did something to make it untenable for him.

00:34:44.060 So they either made it untenable for him or they got rid of him, but either way, Glenn,

00:34:48.800 way to not understand your audience.

00:34:50.780 Like Tucker is the reason most people even talk about Fox good or bad these days.

00:34:56.960 See, I think I, I will tell you that the, the main reason I hear, I'm not watching Fox at

00:35:02.660 all, but I watch Tucker, you know, all every night.

00:35:05.420 I hear that all the time.

00:35:08.120 Um, however, I, I think, um, that the message that Fox is sending because Dan, uh, Bongino was

00:35:17.960 let go last week and now this, I think the, the message from Fox Corp is we're going to

00:35:26.540 play ball with the machine.

00:35:27.980 We're, we're not going to, uh, we're not going to get in anybody's way.

00:35:31.880 Just leave us alone. 0.76

00:35:33.800 You might be right.

00:35:34.640 That's certainly how it sounds.

00:35:36.380 That would be what I would glean too.

00:35:38.400 He just came off an interview, a great interview with Trump, a great interview with Elon Musk last

00:35:44.100 week.

00:35:44.960 Not to mention the January 6th.

00:35:46.540 I mean, how do you, how do you have Elon Musk on, uh, in your last week and either be

00:35:55.060 fired or, you know, you know, kind of forced to quit, whatever it is, Elon Musk, that's

00:36:01.380 not a small get that shows you are at the top of the heap.

00:36:08.040 He's consistently either number one or number two, he and the five vie for the number one

00:36:12.520 or number two spots.

00:36:13.360 And the five, that's one thing that's five people, you know, it's like, that's very different

00:36:19.420 to say that any one of those people could go on and take over and get the kind of numbers

00:36:22.900 that Tucker does.

00:36:23.520 As you know, it's much harder to do it on your own.

00:36:26.620 And he was doing it, um, either number one or number two consistently.

00:36:30.080 And so, you know, there's, there's going to be more to this story.

00:36:34.080 All I know.

00:36:34.900 And I think Glenn and I are in agreement is he's got a very bright future ahead of him,

00:36:38.860 a brighter, more joyous and potentially more lucrative future.

00:36:42.860 What do you think, what do you think his non-compete is?

00:36:47.380 And in New York, if they fire you, it's nothing.

00:36:51.840 I know.

00:36:52.240 If they let you go.

00:36:53.020 It says they, they had a mutual agreement.

00:36:56.400 I mean, they, they must've come to an agreement that's going to let him go free.

00:36:59.340 You know, like they, they used to not consider people like you and me competitors.

00:37:04.020 They won't let us book Fox news talent anymore on my show that they're not allowed to come

00:37:08.120 on this program.

00:37:08.800 Yeah.

00:37:09.100 Oh yeah.

00:37:09.460 Cause now we're big enough.

00:37:10.900 Yeah.

00:37:11.260 Yeah.

00:37:11.500 Because you're big and we're big enough now that they're like, no, you're competitors.

00:37:14.900 Well, Tucker would be a competitor for sure.

00:37:17.360 And I'm sure, um, while they probably wouldn't try to stop him from making a living, they're

00:37:21.000 not going to let him get, you know, any of the Fox news contributors, but that who cares?

00:37:24.560 You can make it as you know, as I know, you can make it huge in this lane without those

00:37:29.800 ridiculous people overseeing everything you say.

00:37:31.780 I tell you, we have, we've been preparing an offer for him, uh, for, for a few days.

00:37:38.080 Um, just, just to be ready in case, cause it looks, it is looked dicey for a while.

00:37:43.440 And, uh, we hope to present him an offer at the blaze cause he wouldn't miss a step.

00:37:49.900 We just take it go.

00:37:52.200 I mean, I, I think, uh, I think Tucker will do very, very well for himself.

00:37:57.360 And I think that if we start working together, you know, Megan, we tried to get you for a

00:38:04.520 while.

00:38:05.380 Um, but, uh, we have to start, uh, working together somewhat, even in our own, if it's

00:38:12.620 separate companies, we just have to stand as one or we're doomed.

00:38:17.040 I agree that I totally agree with you that this is why I love the daily wire, even though

00:38:21.200 I'm not part of the daily wire and I love the blaze, uh, this is, it's important.

00:38:25.100 And we support all those guys.

00:38:26.720 And I know you do too.

00:38:27.540 And I've, you, this is like, it's sort of a brotherhood over here slash sister.

00:38:32.800 And, uh, it's way more supportive and joyful and free than any news organization I've ever

00:38:40.880 worked at.

00:38:41.440 And so I think he's going to be, he has nothing but blue sky, nothing but blue sky ahead.

00:38:46.740 Yeah.

00:38:47.180 Glenn, thank you.

00:38:47.980 Great to see you.

00:38:48.860 You bet.

00:38:49.200 Bye-bye.

00:38:49.900 All right.

00:38:50.120 In just a bit, we have another Glenn joining us with reaction and that's Glenn Greenwald,

00:38:53.300 um, with reaction to both Tucker Carlson and Don Lemon separating from their cable news

00:38:58.060 companies.

00:38:58.380 You got to think that CNN was waiting to drop the hammer on Don Lemon and just thought, I'm

00:39:02.840 just going to draft behind the Tucker news.

00:39:04.600 I just have to draft it.

00:39:05.460 No one's going to talk about Don.

00:39:06.860 Get in there.

00:39:07.940 Drop it.

00:39:09.080 But you know, they did it by calling his agent, telling his agent to tell him.

00:39:12.800 Steve comes back, then Glenn comes back and we'll get to the, the view reaction.

00:39:17.820 Steve, um, let's talk about what the ladies on the view are saying.

00:39:22.200 It's somewhat stomach turning, but we have a clip.

00:39:24.460 Let's watch.

00:39:24.900 The word has just come down that Fox News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part

00:39:31.780 ways.

00:39:35.300 We thank you for your service to the network and host of the prior contributor.

00:39:40.680 Wave.

00:39:45.560 Can I ask the audience if they'll help me do something?

00:39:48.220 Come on, folks.

00:39:51.380 Nah, nah, nah, nah.

00:39:53.140 Nah, nah, nah, nah.

00:39:55.360 Hey, hey, hey.

00:39:57.740 Goodbye.

00:40:01.680 They're disgusting.

00:40:02.840 She's Anna Navarro in your wildest imagination.

00:40:06.020 You could never solo host a show ever.

00:40:08.260 Not one of those women ever could. 0.98

00:40:10.680 Some have tried and failed.

00:40:12.360 You will only ever make it as part of an ensemble and you could never hope to achieve the success

00:40:17.500 that Tucker Carlson has.

00:40:18.980 So you can sit in your little cheap seats all day long and enjoy your little negative

00:40:23.660 henpecking.

00:40:24.580 But your careers are going nowhere and Tucker is about to dominate in whatever space he

00:40:29.180 goes to.

00:40:30.040 What do you make of it, Steve?

00:40:32.200 Yeah.

00:40:32.640 Well, you summed it up well.

00:40:34.600 There's no greater sign of the power of Tucker Carlson than watching the glee.

00:40:39.740 I mean, this is a cable news host and there is massive applause in the View audience when

00:40:44.620 they say that they've agreed to part ways, that Anna Navarro feels so compelled to sing

00:40:48.860 a song at his exit.

00:40:51.200 This is the power of someone who has crossed over from the news, only a rare space that

00:40:57.160 very few people occupy.

00:40:58.520 Most people, if you ask them, most average Americans wouldn't even know two people at

00:41:05.200 MSNBC.

00:41:05.840 They probably couldn't name a single host of the View besides Whoopi Goldberg, perhaps

00:41:10.280 maybe Joy Behar.

00:41:11.660 They don't know any of these people who are celebrating Tucker leaving.

00:41:16.100 It's just a show of just how truly powerful he is.

00:41:19.260 And it's funny, as I was watching with you and Glenn, I mean, Tucker is someone who, if

00:41:24.780 you trace his career, this is a person who hosted shows at CNN, hosted shows at the

00:41:28.520 show at MSNBC and now hosts a show or had been hosting a show at Fox, one of the very

00:41:32.660 few people to do that.

00:41:34.240 Someone who had an incredible writing career.

00:41:36.680 I mean, he's an amazing writer, notoriously someone who writes all of his monologues that

00:41:42.380 you see on the air and a lot of the rest of the show has talked about that and doesn't

00:41:46.020 own a TV.

00:41:46.960 And so will not get to enjoy the View trying to dance on Tucker.

00:41:52.860 He will never watch that.

00:41:54.180 I think he actually would enjoy that clip.

00:41:55.920 He's not the kind of guy who gets irritated by things like that.

00:41:58.740 Just just I am on his behalf.

00:42:00.780 Let's talk about some of the media reaction pouring in.

00:42:03.760 Brian Stelter making it about Brian Stelter.

00:42:08.640 Here's what he tweets.

00:42:10.180 Tucker Carlson out at Fox News effective immediately.

00:42:12.380 This is an earth shaking moment in cable.

00:42:14.420 I've tried calling and texting Tucker for comment on his stunning departure from Fox.

00:42:18.040 No response yet.

00:42:20.300 Don't hold your breath, hall monitor.

00:42:22.280 The biggest tell in Fox's press release about Tucker's exit is he is not getting a final

00:42:28.100 show.

00:42:28.940 No chance to say goodbye on his own terms or point people to his next home.

00:42:33.100 Fox says Carlson's last program was Friday, April 21st.

00:42:36.940 When CNN ended reliable sources, I was offered a final episode.

00:42:42.240 He's actually comparing himself and reliable sources to Tucker, the number one show in cable

00:42:50.020 versus this loser show literally just Brian and his mother watched.

00:42:53.500 That's it.

00:42:55.020 I really appreciated the chance to sign off.

00:42:57.880 I think viewers did, too.

00:42:59.900 Tucker leaving Fox without even saying goodbye.

00:43:01.980 Stunning.

00:43:02.520 OK, Brian, tell us more about reliable sources and how it was just like being the number one

00:43:06.220 show in all the cable.

00:43:07.080 Oh, my God.

00:43:08.900 I mean, the cognitive dissonance there.

00:43:10.780 Listen, it's been a rough it's been a rough couple days, weeks.

00:43:14.260 I mean, the Dominion settlement now feels like weeks ago.

00:43:16.760 I guess that was only a few days ago.

00:43:18.580 You know, Brian's got a book about Fox, a sequel to his his book, Hoax, that is really

00:43:24.560 going to have to tear up the thing because, I mean, the amount of news that's pouring in,

00:43:28.260 it's really unfortunate.

00:43:29.460 It's already going to be very dated.

00:43:30.420 I don't know if he's closed it out yet.

00:43:31.560 Probably has at this point.

00:43:32.560 And then he had, as you mentioned, the Vanity Fair gig and the podcast, it was supposed

00:43:36.700 to be about Dominion.

00:43:38.020 It's like the news sources.

00:43:40.480 Think about the industry, Megan, that's been created around Tucker Carlson.

00:43:43.780 Media Matters exists because of Tucker Carlson.

00:43:46.480 I don't know what they're going to do when they don't get to write about what he's saying

00:43:50.860 in the most unfair and out of context way every day.

00:43:55.120 They lose a big there's the whole that's just media matters.

00:43:58.420 I mean, the rest of the media industry, CNN's JV, terrible media reporter that's left in

00:44:03.300 the wake of Brian Stelther's exit, will have nothing to talk about because all he does is

00:44:07.260 watch Tucker Carlson and then write things about it out of context.

00:44:10.300 It's really going to leave a big hole in the media industry that that was built around trying

00:44:14.180 to tear down Tucker.

00:44:16.560 That the only question is who's going to now the next question will be is who's going to

00:44:21.060 replace Tucker in the rotating cast.

00:44:23.140 The only person who could even potentially do it is Greg Gutfeld.

00:44:26.120 Um, but Greg Gutfeld already has a show, uh, airing every night.

00:44:29.940 They could move it from 11 to eight.

00:44:32.280 I love Greg, but he'd have to totally change the show to go at eight, you know, the humor

00:44:36.420 and all that.

00:44:36.940 Like, I think that would be, it works better later in the evening.

00:44:40.360 And, um, so it's a tough choice.

00:44:41.960 I mean, I remember Roger telling me that the only person he could put in for Bill O'Reilly

00:44:45.360 who would actually pull a number was Greg Gutfeld.

00:44:47.660 And that was at eight.

00:44:48.960 So he's, he's a possibility, uh, for 8 PM beyond that.

00:44:52.440 They don't have the bench right now that they used to.

00:44:54.480 They, they, you know, once Roger left, they got out of the star development business

00:44:58.820 and, you know, look, they don't even have somebody who's a potential Tucker.

00:45:02.940 Tucker is a unicorn.

00:45:04.480 Um, and I do think they're going to have a massive audience backlash here that they're

00:45:09.120 probably not, not prepared for.

00:45:10.960 This is, um, from Doug Brunt feels like cable news as a platform is getting fired.

00:45:15.620 Yeah.

00:45:16.220 I think you may be right.

00:45:17.700 I mean, you talk about the massive bench.

00:45:20.700 I don't even know if they, if they need a person like a superstar to be paid, you know,

00:45:25.740 tens of twenties, millions of dollars in order to, to occupy that seat. 0.71

00:45:29.120 Uh, we saw how they did at 7 PM.

00:45:30.980 They did that rotating cast for over a year, eventually going with Jesse waters, which seemed

00:45:34.760 like the safe choice there.

00:45:35.820 He had been there forever.

00:45:36.940 Um, you know, we've got people like my friend, Will Kane, uh, and, and others who will likely

00:45:40.920 get a shot.

00:45:41.460 They're the fill-ins for Tucker, Will, Pete Hegseth and others.

00:45:44.360 Um, do you need a super duper star at that position to pull a number?

00:45:48.140 You won't be able to pull Tucker's number.

00:45:50.060 I don't even know if you could with Greg.

00:45:51.580 Um, so at this point, just kind of keep the, keep the train moving.

00:45:54.960 I will see.

00:45:55.720 I don't know if it's going to be this gigantic hire.

00:45:58.720 Uh, CNN just announced very recently.

00:46:01.300 I think it was yesterday.

00:46:02.500 They announced that Charles Barkley and Gail King had been hired to do a single hour of

00:46:07.080 television, uh, on Wednesday nights at 9 PM once a week, uh, with a panel show.

00:46:11.880 And I think they're paying them a lot of money.

00:46:13.280 I don't know if that format is really the, the success model that it maybe used to be

00:46:17.780 in, uh, in the, in the new cable news environment and really in the new independent media environment

00:46:21.880 where shows that are independent are enormous and can pull giant audiences like this one.

00:46:26.480 I mean, if my advice to Will Kane is use that spot for all it's worth, if they give it to

00:46:30.280 you and then bounce out of there to digital media, where you can be your own King and you

00:46:34.420 can have a direct relationship with your audience that watches you if they watch you because

00:46:38.800 they want to hear from you, not just because you followed the seven o'clock or, you know what I

00:46:43.100 mean? Like that's the beauty of making it over in this lane. If people know you and they gravitate

00:46:46.900 toward you, they're there for you, not because of the platform. The audience relationship is much

00:46:53.220 more authentic.

00:46:55.040 It's it's to be honest. It's, it's why Tucker Carlson has said he made such a big, uh, emphasis

00:47:00.780 on being, getting involved with Fox nation, which is their streaming platform. He has said that that

00:47:05.360 is uncancelable. If I'm ever canceled because of my show, because of advertisers, that one,

00:47:10.100 they can't touch because it's totally subscription based. Um, I think that the most of the people,

00:47:14.400 even, even in the traditional media environment get that the, that the shift is completely happening

00:47:20.120 massively now. And this is potentially just a sign of where, where we're going with the rest of it.

00:47:24.900 Um, yeah, but just to clarify, Tucker's gone from Fox nation. He didn't own that show. Yeah. He was

00:47:31.100 just saying if my, if my primetime show gets canceled because of the no advertisers, I can always go over

00:47:35.340 here. Well, he can do subscription base wherever he wants. You heard Glenn talking about the blaze

00:47:39.780 wants him. You heard, uh, Jeremy boring's tweeting out lock. A lot of people asking if he's coming to

00:47:43.180 the daily wire. I suspect he already has a plan, but we'd be, we'd break out the big novelty checkbook

00:47:47.860 for him. If he doesn't, um, Tim pool, Tucker Carlson, 2024. And then you got the Liz Cheney's of the

00:47:54.000 world after all of Tucker's lies and defamation, defamation. It's about time. We'll get to the

00:47:59.620 Lincoln project and more when, uh, Glenn Greenwald joins us next on the seismic Tucker fallout and

00:48:06.180 Don Lemon finally gone at CNN. Big pieces of news today in the media industry, Tucker Carlson parting

00:48:15.920 ways with Fox news in just a stunning development. Um, Don Lemon has also been terminated at CNN,

00:48:22.100 less of a stunning development, but still big news. Um, you know, they had been standing behind him,

00:48:27.580 notwithstanding so many controversies and the upheaval on that morning show and it's terrible

00:48:32.200 ratings and the way he was treating his colleagues. And, and Chris Licht was on the record, like

00:48:36.440 recently saying, Oh, only the old Don Lemon was controversial. He's changed all that. And then boom,

00:48:41.360 you're fired. What, why, what happened? Um, just a little bit of color for you. Uh, just following

00:48:48.000 Twitter, like Steve's, my own texts are blowing up and DMS on Twitter and so on, but Jeremy Boring,

00:48:54.660 CEO of the daily wire partner of Ben Shapiro tweets out. I told you, he said a lot of people

00:48:59.180 are asking if Tucker's coming here, we'd love to have him. Uh, but he's probably got other plans.

00:49:02.940 Jeremy then tweets. A lot of people are asking if Don Lemon is coming to the real daily wire.

00:49:07.160 Just kidding. No one is asking that. No, no. Don Lemon will not be going to the real daily wire.

00:49:13.680 And then just this from Carol Markowitz, friend of the show, uh, New York post columnist among

00:49:18.120 others. And she writes Tucker Carlson is one of the kindest, realist, smartest people I originally

00:49:22.820 wrote in media, but no anywhere. That's the thing about Tucker. Um, he's been so demonized by the,

00:49:31.760 the mainstream media, the leftist media. It's the same thing now that people have this opinion of

00:49:38.620 him, especially Democrats. If you're looking for a reason to hate pundits on the right, you've been

00:49:43.240 given so many reasons, but are they real? You know, who is Tucker Carlson? In my experience,

00:49:48.620 he is a gracious, delightful, kind, loving, loyal, great friend. And the racist accusations against

00:49:56.000 him are just, if you, it's all it takes is five minutes to actually look at what he did say

00:50:00.740 to figure out, Oh my God, how horrible is he? And you figure out once again, they're pushing their

00:50:06.220 own agenda and misrepresenting his words. It's not to defend everything that Tucker has ever said

00:50:11.480 or his choices of words in all instances. But I'm telling you, it's been like a,

00:50:16.480 a partisan hit job on him from the left, from the moment he took over that post.

00:50:20.800 And I'll tell you one other thing. The reason in part that Tucker was in that post is because

00:50:25.820 I recommended to Lachlan Murdoch that he move him there. When I was leaving Fox, Lachlan and I had a

00:50:31.320 good relationship and he said, who do you think I should move into your spot? And I said, I would move

00:50:36.160 Tucker. I said, he's brilliant. He does his homework. As you know, you heard Steve mentioning,

00:50:41.120 he's a reader. He's an avid reader and writer. I mean, he, he is not some guy who's just looking

00:50:45.580 to be a news star. And he, at that time in 17, Trump had just won, um, understood the Trump audience

00:50:53.580 and the Trump voters in a way that was going to be really important for Fox over the coming four

00:50:57.680 years. And not everybody did, you know, even though Tucker was more, yeah, I don't know.

00:51:03.200 His background is more establishment GOP. You'd say the old Tucker with the bow tie of

00:51:07.580 MSNBC and CNN. Tucker got it. He understood exactly why Trump was resonating. And from early

00:51:14.860 on when he was weekend host of Fox and friends, and I used to have him on the Kelly file all the

00:51:18.700 time. And I'd say, I'd say, my God, he's so smart. This guy gets it. He gets it in a way.

00:51:23.040 Not everybody gets it. You know, he wasn't the only one. I remember feeling that way about

00:51:27.160 Byron York, but Tucker both got it and has this great screen presence and is really smart and

00:51:32.440 able to deliver a talking points moment, all this stuff. So, but I remember when he took over that

00:51:37.880 role, I remember I was getting my hair done and we were talking about it on the phone and he was

00:51:42.500 saying, thank you for the recommendation. And he earned it a hundred percent. It wasn't because of

00:51:45.960 me. It was just a, I just weighed in. Um, and he said, thank you. And I said, hold on. You might not

00:51:54.740 want to thank me because I know some things about this job that you may not know yet that you're about

00:52:00.100 to find out about really fast. And, um, you know, the truth is it's an extremely toxic post,

00:52:07.300 extremely toxic. And you can take that for me and times it by a hundred from when he took over,

00:52:14.440 you know, during the era of Trump as somebody who was open-minded to Trump and at times defensive of

00:52:21.440 Trump. I mean, and Tucker's just not afraid. So all those things made him a huge target. And trust me,

00:52:28.820 it has not been easy on him. He's a human being, notwithstanding what you might read in the New York

00:52:34.760 times. He has a family. He, he does get stressed by the threats on his life, on his family's life's

00:52:42.300 lives. He's not just, he doesn't crumble easily at criticism or somebody, you know,

00:52:47.960 like the view laughing at him, but it's not an easy post. It's just not. So one of the many reasons

00:52:55.140 I think he's going to be happier in whatever he does next, I guarantee he's not going to CNN.

00:52:59.940 He's not going to pop up on the CNN morning show in Dodd's old slot. I'm sure he's going to go

00:53:04.740 independent and crush it. Um, joining me now to discuss that lean and much, much more is Glenn

00:53:09.940 Greenwald, Pulitzer prize winning journalist and host of rumbles system update. Glenn, your reaction

00:53:16.280 to the news. I mean, it's, it's, it's stunning in one way, you know, it reminds me a little bit.

00:53:23.180 I don't mean to draw this melodramatic analogy, but if you have someone, you know, and the doctor says,

00:53:29.280 oh, the person has a lot of health problems, there's a possibility that they may become fatal.

00:53:36.020 And then the person actually dies on the one hand, you know, you kind of expected it. You,

00:53:41.220 it's not coming out of left field. You know, there's reasons why it might've happened,

00:53:44.860 but on the other hand, to actually see it happen when it actually happens,

00:53:47.960 it's still quite shocking. And that's how I feel about this. It's not as though

00:53:54.020 it's impossible to have perceived that there are differences and tensions between Tucker and Fox

00:54:01.440 on the, uh, between Tucker on the one hand, Fox on the other, but for them to get to the point,

00:54:06.160 and we don't know, I don't know, even as Tucker's friend, exactly what precipitated the events over

00:54:11.620 the last few days, whether he quit, whether he was fired, whether it really was mutual.

00:54:15.840 Um, we're obviously going to find out, but I think it is really important to note that

00:54:22.140 there are a lot of ideological divisions within the Republican party in a way that is not true

00:54:28.520 for the democratic party or the left. There's real ideological split. I mean, Trump in 2016 ran

00:54:33.660 against the Bush Cheney foreign policy. Even Reaganomics is an economic policy, something that

00:54:40.060 was unheard of. It split the establishment and the populist wing. And you could just watch in

00:54:45.940 between the eight o'clock and the nine o'clock show on vital issues like Ukraine and U S security

00:54:50.080 state, the CIA, Julian Assange, all kinds of issues. Tucker had fundamentally different views than say

00:54:56.500 Sean Hannity, who more reflects this kind of establishment Republican conservative approach.

00:55:02.620 And I don't think it's appreciated the extent to which Tucker has become very ideologically

00:55:08.160 heterodox and very much outside of the mold of say what liberal establishment institutions like to

00:55:16.200 propagate about Fox, that it's nothing more than this mindless loyalist channel to the Republican

00:55:21.180 party or to conservative orthodoxy. In the case of Tucker and a few other people there as well,

00:55:25.780 that's simply not the case. And those tensions clearly have been boiling over for a while.

00:55:30.440 I, you know, I haven't been there since 2017, but that would have been a plus back in my day.

00:55:38.700 They would have loved having a diverse, a diversity of opinion. You know, when I was on the air in

00:55:42.940 primetime, it was me, Bill O'Reilly, Greta, Sean, you know, Greta was a Democrat. As far as we knew,

00:55:48.900 she didn't really talk about her politics, but if anything, you know, her history had been more

00:55:52.020 left-leaning. Sean, of course, Republican. O'Reilly was a populist and I was an independent

00:55:58.000 and they loved it. There was no, you know, that was good. It was good for America. I like Tucker.

00:56:04.340 One of the things that's made him special is that you never know where he's going to come down. You

00:56:08.540 can't always predict, you know, like remember early on in COVID, he was like, take it very

00:56:13.820 seriously. It's a very serious disease. I think it's going to kill a lot of people when he flew

00:56:17.440 to Mar-a-Lago to tell Trump that. Remember, he flew to Mar-a-Lago to urge Trump to take it more

00:56:22.040 seriously. And then the Sidney Powell thing is what I was talking with Steve. Like, how could it be

00:56:26.340 Dominion? That if they fired him, how could it be over Dominion? Yes, I realized there were some

00:56:30.820 controversial texts, but he was the one who went out on the air and said, Sidney Powell is a liar.

00:56:35.540 He, you could argue he saved Fox from worse pain. That sort of gave the permission to a lot of others

00:56:41.100 who'd been holding out. Like, you don't need to take this woman seriously. So like, I just can't 1.00

00:56:46.740 imagine his heterodox views did it. I could be wrong. I mean, I definitely could be wrong. I don't,

00:56:50.800 I don't know this board and I don't know the management anymore.

00:56:52.760 Yeah. I mean, you know, it's a little hard to, but I think we're both a little hamstrung. You

00:56:58.640 know, when someone's your friend, you get some information in the context of the friendship.

00:57:01.460 You don't want to, you know, talk about that publicly because it's really up to the person

00:57:06.960 to speak for themselves. But some things are public and visible. And I think the fact that

00:57:15.020 he, it is so amazing, Megan, that it's sometimes it really is frightening the ability of the

00:57:20.800 mainstream media to create an, a reality for that people ingest that is completely the opposite of

00:57:26.100 the truth. I guarantee you, if you asked most liberals, most Democrats, people who consume

00:57:32.260 liberal media about Tucker's views of fraud during the 2020 election, they will tell you,

00:57:37.680 oh, privately, he was saying he didn't believe it, but publicly he was endorsing it to please his

00:57:42.660 audience. When the reality is exactly the opposite, we did an entire show on what Tucker was saying in

00:57:48.380 real time. And as you just said, he went on a huge limb. He angered a large part of the Fox audience

00:57:53.440 by saying, look, if Sidney Powell and these fraud claims are truthful, this is the greatest crime

00:57:59.340 of in American history. But we need evidence before we believe them in you. The audience should need

00:58:05.460 evidence before you believe them. And Sidney Powell refuses to provide any. And that's leading me to

00:58:09.840 believe that she's lying. That is the kind of integrity and the kind of willingness to challenge

00:58:15.640 the agenda and perceptions of your own audience that is almost unheard of on the other cable

00:58:21.960 networks. Megan, when is the last time someone on CNN or MSNBC stood up and said something that was

00:58:28.000 alienating of the Democratic Party and its leaders or the liberal audience, the small but still loyal

00:58:34.720 liberal audience that they cultivate? It almost never happens. Where are the differences ideologically on

00:58:39.960 these other networks? So I don't know that this heterodox heterodoxy of Tucker is a factor in why

00:58:46.720 this happened. We don't know yet. But what I do know is that that it is very real. And if you compare

00:58:53.020 Tucker and Hannity, obviously, on some views, they have similar views, immigration or whatever. But on

00:58:59.280 major, major issues, they have fundamental disagreements. And I think that reflects the fact that Fox is in a kind

00:59:05.820 of position where it does seem to be wanting to move Fox away from their kind of populist heterodox

00:59:14.060 growth in conservative politics, MAGA or America first or whatever you want to call it, which Tucker,

00:59:19.700 by the way, was not an absolute adherent of. He was critical of that at times as well and kind of

00:59:24.180 return to the days when, you know, I think it was it's more in line with supporting the Republican

00:59:30.040 Party, the traditional Republican Party, the pre-Trump Republican Party of Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan.

00:59:35.260 And we'll see who replaces Tucker. But I'd be willing to wager a lot more a lot of money that it's much

00:59:40.420 more like, say, Hannity, who I'm not criticizing. I'm just describing where he is ideologically than Tucker.

00:59:46.960 Paul Ryan, who I believe is chairman of the board right now at Fox, you know, and I like Paul Ryan, but, you

00:59:53.100 know, I understand the politics at play. And and I also get it. Trust me, as a businesswoman, I also understand

00:59:59.460 you just had to pay eight hundred dollars, eight hundred dollars, eight hundred million dollars to

01:00:03.840 settle the Dominion lawsuit. And you have a Smartmatic lawsuit coming at you right around the corner

01:00:08.800 where they're suing for even more money than Dominion was another billion, two point seven billion instead

01:00:15.620 of one point six billion in the Smartmatic. And you say heads have got a role. But why that head?

01:00:23.100 I don't see an announcement that Maria Bartiromo and I like Maria. I'm not saying Maria should get fired,

01:00:27.660 but she's not fired. Janine Pirro. She's not fired. Lou Dobbs got fired. But the people in the

01:00:33.520 Dominion lawsuit and the Smartmatic lawsuit are Maria, Maria, Maria, Maria, Janine, Lou and Suzanne

01:00:41.540 Scott and a couple of her like top. I mean, really her Suzanne Scott. So how does the seat like where's 0.99

01:00:48.660 that announcement? Why would Tucker be the first to go? Not only does it not make sense that Tucker is

01:00:54.840 the first to go, you could argue that he ought to be the last to go. First of all, beginning with the

01:00:59.380 fact that he generates more more ratings than anybody on that network. There are a couple of

01:01:05.480 people who are closed, but he's still basically setting records in terms of audience size that are

01:01:11.860 the top records in the history of cable news in terms of his audience size. And even once Trump went

01:01:17.100 away, it really it waned a little, but not very much at all. And I also, you know, you look at ratings

01:01:23.840 and, you know, among young Democrats who watch cable news, more young Democrats watch Tucker's show

01:01:30.520 than any show on MSNBC or CNN, which doesn't surprise me at all. Because again, as you said

01:01:36.440 earlier, it's not predictable where he falls, where he comes down on things. And I've never seen anybody,

01:01:42.680 Megan, on with a national platform, a media platform of that kind, who's more willing to stand up and say,

01:01:49.780 when I used to think this, I was wrong, I've come to change the ways that I think. And here's the reasons

01:01:55.600 I've changed the ways I think on so many issues. He I mean, I don't know how many times I've been on his show

01:02:01.420 where he said, you know, you used to say this, and I thought you were crazy. And now I've come to see that. In fact,

01:02:06.160 a lot of the things you were saying are things that I now realize are true. This willingness to change his mind

01:02:11.800 to admit when he's wrong. And Megan, if I were Fox News, and I wanted to prove to the public that major

01:02:19.540 personalities on Fox were not on board, the claim that Smartmatic or Dominion engineered election

01:02:29.080 fraud through voting machines, the person to whom I would first point or one of the people would be

01:02:33.560 Tucker. As we just talked about, he was the one who was willing to alienate the audience, his audience,

01:02:38.440 in order to tell them that the evidence for it was simply not there. And I think what is happening

01:02:44.800 is because he has become public enemy number one with Trump gone, he really is public enemy number

01:02:50.320 one of the liberal establishment. Maybe Elon Musk is the only one who competes with him. And of course,

01:02:55.740 Trump's always there. But Tucker is the focal point. It seems like a kind of appeasement on the

01:03:01.920 part of Fox. It does. Oh, we're moving back into your good graces. It does.

01:03:08.000 And once again, the irony, the irony, if you look at how this whole thing unfolded, Glenn,

01:03:15.740 it started with Fox making the Arizona call, which was a a journalistic decision that wound up being

01:03:24.120 very controversial and ultimately was deemed to be too close by Fox's defenders and its attackers

01:03:30.480 alike. OK, but made in good faith and by journalists who had this newfangled equipment and had very good

01:03:37.500 reason to believe in what they were what they were doing. It wasn't ideological like we're dying for

01:03:41.780 Joe Biden to win. They thought that they had it before anybody and they wanted to get ahead of it.

01:03:45.300 So they wind up firing Chris Stierwald. They wind up firing Bill Salmon. They don't fire the head

01:03:51.200 of the decision desk aren't in Michigan. They fire Chris Stierwald, who they put out on the air to

01:03:56.020 defend the call. But then he became the face of the call. So they fired his ass. OK, that makes sense.

01:04:01.620 This guy loyally serving the company for years and years. And he's great. Gave great advice. Bill

01:04:06.140 Salmon, too. OK, they're gone. They're sacrificial lambs. Then the audience is still in revolt. They're still

01:04:11.720 not satisfied. They're very pissed off about the Arizona called. It wasn't enough. They fired those

01:04:15.080 two. And then the Dominion stuff starts popping up. Sidney Powell, Giuliani, Dominion, Smartmatic,

01:04:19.520 votes were flipped. And Fox leans too far into that to try to win the audience back because the internal

01:04:24.720 text show, they're going to Newsmax, they're going to OANN. We've got to get them back. Right. So

01:04:28.780 they're in this mad dash to get the audience back. And now they finally have to settle for eight

01:04:33.760 hundred million dollars, one of those lawsuits. And what do they do? They alienate that very same base.

01:04:39.980 Again, those people who were mad were probably largely Tucker's audience. Yes, probably Hannity's

01:04:46.680 audience as well. But like you think they're going to react well to this. And now Tucker's gone. You

01:04:51.980 paid off Dominion and you you parted way ways with our favorite host. I mean, you know, I don't I think

01:05:01.580 I've seen this before. You know, I have watched, for example, people like Mark Zuckerberg,

01:05:07.480 who started off as a steadfast, adamant opponent of online censorship, gradually appeased these demands

01:05:17.280 from The New York Times and other liberal institutions. And you sometimes have this

01:05:21.380 caricature in your head that a billionaire of his wealth is immune to those kinds of pressures.

01:05:28.640 But it turns out that people aren't because human beings want to be accepted. They want to go to

01:05:34.180 parties and not be scorned and ostracized. They worry about their legacy. And so they start

01:05:39.420 thinking, maybe I can give some give some outreach, give some crumbs to the people who hate me,

01:05:46.020 and then they'll hate me less if I do what they want. And it never works. It has the opposite effect.

01:05:52.620 You think they're going to start, you know, stop with Tucker. And then at the same time,

01:05:56.420 what they've done is they've taken I mean, I've been out with Tucker before. I've seen how people come up

01:06:01.260 to him and in like, with all their heart, you know, tell him that he's, you know, one of the few

01:06:07.480 people they trust on television. I mean, his audience is so loyal, because he gives things

01:06:12.880 that really no one else can provide in terms of his perspective, his integrity, like they feel it,

01:06:19.500 you know, they trust him so much. I don't think he's replaceable in in easily. I'm not saying Fox is

01:06:25.140 going to collapse without him. But it really seems to me like this is I don't know, the Murdochs or

01:06:30.560 management at Fox kind of just saying, OK, Tucker is such a flashpoint that if we get rid of him,

01:06:38.760 we can kind of have more breathing room again.

01:06:41.620 Let's be clear on one thing. Let's be clear on one thing. This doesn't happen without Rupert's

01:06:46.080 blessing. No way. This is not. I've been critical of Suzanne Scott, who I like as a human, 0.80

01:06:52.140 but she just handled the Dominion thing so poorly. But there is zero chance they part way with Tucker

01:06:59.140 without Rupert's direct involvement. I mean, just period. I don't know what persuaded him.

01:07:05.940 I just cannot believe that it was the left, but it could have been the board. And on the subject of

01:07:11.400 the left, let me give you a couple of samples. OK, here is. The Lincoln Project, please forgive me

01:07:19.680 while I throw up my mouth. Tucker Carlson is an abomination, a driver of conspiracy and the worst

01:07:26.360 our nation has to offer. Good riddance. Ellie Mistal of The Nation, MSNBC contributor who hates

01:07:33.260 white people, texts or tweets out, where do we think Tucker will fail up to next? Vice President,

01:07:40.420 Spotify, CNN, Grand Wizard. We played the view crew cheering and singing, you know, na, na, na, na,

01:07:54.000 goodbye. George Takai, the Star Trek guy. Is that how you pronounce his last name? I only ever see it in

01:07:59.800 writing. Don't let the door hit you on your way out. It's better that way. OK. Don't let the door hit

01:08:05.840 you on your way out, you horrid soulless man. Hashtag Tucker Carlson. On the other hand, go ahead.

01:08:11.040 Let it hit you good. They hate him. But Glenn, here's the thing. I realize Tucker's a unique

01:08:18.220 brand for sure. But in a way, this kind of reminds me of the fight Trump and DeSantis are having

01:08:22.580 where DeSantis came out. He was like, I don't know anything about paying off a porn star that you

01:08:28.680 cheated on your wife with. It's not really my area of expertise. And I get it. DeSantis saw a chance.

01:08:34.340 He seemed to have actually a lovely marriage and a lovely wife and not have at all the weird

01:08:39.620 situation that Trump has in his marriage. However, Trump's response was, you just wait.

01:08:46.500 You see what they do to you if you wind up in the big chair, never mind getting the nomination.

01:08:52.580 And he was right about that. And it may be that the board had had it with Tucker being the center

01:08:59.180 of so much attention. But you just you think who is it the eight o'clock before Tucker? Oh,

01:09:03.920 it was Bill O'Reilly. They didn't exactly love him either. Right. I mean, he was a massive target

01:09:08.880 too. And I've told the story before, but it bears repeating here. When I was elevated to the prime

01:09:12.560 time, I went to Bill and I was like, so what do you think? You know, like, is this going to be good?

01:09:16.380 And he was like, oh, I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy. I'm like, what? And he said,

01:09:21.620 cable news is a snake pit. And it is, especially in prime time. So who if Fox is thinking, oh,

01:09:28.960 we're going to get like Trump without the baggage, you know, we're going to get Tucker without the

01:09:32.940 baggage. No, the left media matters, which is now quoted regularly in The New York Times,

01:09:38.060 they're going to try to saddle whoever steps into that role with all the same names and baggage.

01:09:44.600 You know, I first of all, I hope we don't lose sight. And and this doesn't obscure something that

01:09:50.440 happened yesterday, which was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez went on the show of Jen Psaki, 0.99

01:09:55.080 the former Biden White House press secretary, and explicitly advocated the government should ban

01:10:03.040 Tucker Carlson specifically from being on television. She talked about how the permissibility

01:10:09.100 standards are too broad for what regulators are allowing in terms of people who are going on the

01:10:14.120 air and try to invoke the Brandenburg standard, the one place where you can the government can go and

01:10:20.100 not violate the First Amendment, claiming he incites imminently incites violence, which is so

01:10:25.540 preposterous. But they didn't just hate Tucker, they wanted Tucker off the air. It's a gigantic

01:10:30.160 victory for the left. And this is the thing, Megan, that I find so amazing, you know, just as somebody

01:10:35.620 who has my own kind of heterodox viewpoints that for a long time, those views were associated with the

01:10:41.800 left. Tucker is the most vocal opponent of the US proxy war in Ukraine, he probably is the most

01:10:49.900 strident critic of the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security. He did more than anybody to advocate a pardon for

01:10:59.700 Julian Assange. When the US government was trying to destabilize Cuba in the name of changing its

01:11:05.460 government, Tucker was the only person on television willing to stand up and say, why is it our role to

01:11:10.540 go and interfere in Cuba? Taking him off primetime removes a lot of important dissent that you almost

01:11:18.620 can't hear anywhere else. You know, Laura Ingram, I think is closer to Tucker than say Hannity and

01:11:22.960 Jesse Waters may be the same. But in terms of being that devoted to that worldview, it is a huge loss.

01:11:29.460 And it's bizarre that the left hates Tucker above all else, because he's in a lot of ways advocating

01:11:35.620 the views that they don't advocate anymore. Now that they're on the side of the CIA and the US

01:11:40.260 security state that they like censorship, that they support the war in Ukraine, all the things that

01:11:46.100 the left used to claim in a lot of ways one can only find on Tucker's show. And that's why I consider

01:11:51.640 it such a huge loss for our discourse. But let me make you feel better. And this is with respect to

01:11:58.840 the players I'm going to mention. Who is more influential, Jesse Waters or Ben Shapiro?

01:12:05.060 Yeah, Ben Shapiro, for sure.

01:12:06.760 There's no question, no question. And Ben, I would have said that about Ben a couple of years ago,

01:12:11.300 too. It's not just today that people who have names, well-known names and well-known audience

01:12:18.360 trust in this lane that you and I are in now can have an exponentially big impact on the national

01:12:25.160 dialogue. You're doing it now on Rumble. I'm over here, but still on YouTube and through SiriusXM and

01:12:31.300 on my podcast. It's all the same show, but, you know, we put it on all the platforms in the news all

01:12:35.620 the time in a way that we can drive the national conversation from our independent and honest

01:12:40.900 posts without having to answer to somebody else's agenda. So he he will still have that voice. I

01:12:47.300 think he could be bigger and more influential than ever just because he's taken off a Fox

01:12:53.200 doesn't mean his voice goes away unless he lets it. But I will say it's going to be tougher for the

01:12:57.620 people who draft behind him. Some of the names you mentioned when he's not as easy to find on the Fox

01:13:03.240 platform anymore. So I bet the rest of the players on Fox will start sounding more establishment D.

01:13:10.360 Look, I mean, Megan, you know, I think that's such an important point and it's the cause of

01:13:14.500 optimism. And you're absolutely right to kind of interject in my sort of gloominess and point

01:13:18.960 out that maybe it's not bad. In fact, maybe it's good. I know personally, when I left the intercept,

01:13:25.100 my audience not only increased, but the trust people had in me did as well. When you're totally

01:13:30.420 independent, they no longer have to suspect that there's corporate constraints on you even

01:13:34.480 subconsciously. And if you obviously I would say, you know, one of the top three or four

01:13:41.840 most influential people in the country is someone that mainstream news outlets barely ever talk about

01:13:47.040 anymore, which is Joe Rogan. And what is it about Joe Rogan more than anything that makes him so

01:13:51.980 trustworthy? It's the fact that no one controls what he says. There's no super corporate structure

01:13:57.280 sitting above him telling him that that he can say this, telling him he can't say this.

01:14:01.580 I really believe the independent part of the media where we are, you know, where people like Joe

01:14:07.080 Rogan are, where a lot of people are, is absolutely the part of the media thriving and exploding.

01:14:12.840 And I really hope Tucker goes to an independent platform because I do. I think you're totally right.

01:14:19.440 That will vastly increase his credibility. And I even think his influence and his reach,

01:14:24.220 obviously, I hope he comes to rumble. I know they have a lot of money waiting for him to

01:14:29.520 try and lure him there. But you're right. He's going to have no shortage of opportunities. And I

01:14:34.220 think maybe getting away from Fox and free him in all those ways could be the thing that actually

01:14:40.100 makes him even more consequential. Yeah, I'm sure they will offer him a bunch of money. But I will

01:14:44.900 say to this, nobody offered me any money. I started up on YouTube. I first I launched my podcast.

01:14:50.520 Nobody was offering me money. I just did it on myself. I was going out there getting

01:14:53.420 advertisers. And I said, I said to my therapist, what if nobody listens? I'm like, what if? And

01:14:59.080 he said, well, Doug and I will listen. So I'm like, I got those two. And then he said, the next week,

01:15:04.500 you probably have nine and you'll build it. And sure enough, we did. And now we're consistently in

01:15:09.140 the top four or five of news podcasts in the country consistently. I mean, that's where we always

01:15:13.100 are. But that was entirely on our own. Now we partnered with Sirius. So now we have an additional

01:15:17.740 platform. But they don't really promote us out there. You know, it's just us rowing and rowing and

01:15:22.780 rowing. We launched YouTube a year and a half ago. That's on fire now. So you can do it without

01:15:27.880 anybody giving you money. They will give Tucker money, but he can do it on his own. And Tucker's

01:15:32.780 already got family dough. We talked about that when he came on our show. Steve will find the episode

01:15:36.660 number. It was a great interview with him. He's not in this for money. He wants to support his family,

01:15:42.340 but he's in this to shape people's minds and the way they think about things. Wait, let me say one

01:15:48.180 other thing, because I know. I know Tucker's a big story, but it is kind of interesting to talk

01:15:53.040 about Don Lemon. What the hell? The contrast is so funny. Why now? Literally, Chris Licht was just

01:15:59.400 out there publicly. He was on some panel like 10 days ago. Steve will tell me. And he was saying,

01:16:05.120 oh, only old Don Lemon is controversial once. You know, now he's past all that. Now he's on mornings.

01:16:10.240 He's past all that. And then boom, he's fired too.

01:16:15.120 And Megan, there may be some hidden thing we don't know about that caused it.

01:16:20.080 And presumably if there is, that will come out. It just happened, you know, a couple hours ago.

01:16:24.980 But here's what I will say. First of all, the contrast is funny because on the one hand,

01:16:28.900 you have Tucker Carlson, who is watched by millions and millions and millions of people and is setting

01:16:33.140 records for ratings in cable news. And on the other hand, you have someone, Don Lemon, who has no audience,

01:16:38.600 even with the gigantic CNN brand behind him. Just people don't want to see or care about or listen

01:16:44.180 to Don Lemon. The thing about it is, I will say, and, you know, we've talked about all these weird,

01:16:49.580 like misogynistic tensions and resentments he has that were so visible. I've seen a couple of clips

01:16:56.880 coming through my Twitter feed and elsewhere and his anger and just like bitterness and resentment

01:17:04.260 with his colleagues and just in life is so palpable. Like you could just tell he's so angry when he has

01:17:10.760 to wait for his co-host to get done with their questions. He really feels like all the attention

01:17:15.740 should be on him. And I, the personality flaws that caused him to have so many problems to have

01:17:21.800 to go to formal re-education therapy or whatever. These are intrinsic in who he is. And it's only getting

01:17:27.880 worse the more he's humiliated. So I'm not surprised it kept building.

01:17:31.880 Maybe he failed camp. He might maybe got apps on the, the, the, the re-education test.

01:17:38.240 Maybe he failed on it. Um, to your point, just last week, they had on the morning show,

01:17:45.320 it was Poppy Harlow and Don, and they had on Vivek Ramaswamy running for president as a Republican

01:17:51.520 candidate. And it was, it was an annoying exchange. Vivek was trying to make a point about black history

01:18:00.020 in America. And Don Lemon accused him of like, don't race Blaine or something. I don't know.

01:18:03.780 He's like, don't tell me about black history. Cause you're all, I guess you're only allowed 1.00

01:18:06.520 to talk about it. If you are black, you're not allowed to just have knowledge about it and comment. 0.98

01:18:10.500 Um, and so it ended kind of tensely between Don and Vivek though. There was a handshake.

01:18:18.220 And then Poppy was clearly trying to be the peacemaker and say, Vivek, the next time you come on,

01:18:24.060 we'll talk about some of these other things we didn't get to. Here's how the ending of that

01:18:28.300 exchange went. Okay. We appreciate you coming on. With due respect, Don, I look forward to

01:18:33.640 continuing that conversation. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Poppy. We'll talk about China.

01:18:38.460 Yes. Next time you come back. Oh, thank you. Much to say on declaring independence from China. 0.86

01:18:42.980 Okay. Something you can add on now. Thank you. Thank you.

01:18:48.460 Right. You see the audience, in case you didn't hear it, he was like, okay, we'll move on now.

01:18:52.700 Thank you. Without even looking at the guests, he's annoyed that Poppy's saying,

01:18:56.480 you'll come back on to talk about China. He's like, I wrapped this interview. Shut the fuck up.

01:19:02.460 We're moving on. Shut up. That's really what was happening there.

01:19:06.260 I mean, it's, it's just, it's unpleasant to watch somebody. It's not like an interesting tension,

01:19:12.900 right? Like sometimes, you know, like people used to love Gore Vidal and William Buckley,

01:19:16.900 like those debates, they really didn't like each other, but it was like driven by a kind of ideological

01:19:21.420 passion. And they were both super charismatic and incredibly well-spoken. People loved it.

01:19:27.780 This though, is just like trivial, small vindictiveness, you know, like diva behavior.

01:19:34.280 And it expresses itself as obvious misogyny. It's unpleasant to watch. And maybe you can get away

01:19:39.920 with it if you're a big star, but as Trump pointed out notoriously, but Don Lamont is not a big star.

01:19:47.800 He's well-known, but nobody, he doesn't bring any ratings in. And so your ability to get away with

01:19:53.120 that is practically zero. None. Their ratings on that morning show are in the toilet. The entire

01:19:58.580 daytime and primetime ratings at CNN are in the toilet. Their main competitor, MSNBC is doubling

01:20:05.680 them right now. They got nothing going, absolutely nothing. And I'm sure he's making a nice salary,

01:20:11.380 but so far he's been untouchable. So I'd love to find out what changed because it was very,

01:20:17.140 the last straw was felt very sudden, uh, much, much more in all this to come. It's always a

01:20:22.280 pleasure, Glenn. Thank you so much for coming on. Great being with you, Megan, as always.

01:20:26.360 Yeah. And again, I want to say Adam Curry, we want to have you back. The pod father was coming

01:20:30.300 on today, but we want to give him the full episode as we promised. So we moved him and we'll tell you

01:20:34.460 what day we moved him to, or we're trying to, um, up next, Rich Lowry of national review will join

01:20:40.200 us. He, I don't know if he's still a Fox news contributor. I don't think he can be and be allowed on the

01:20:44.400 show. So he must just be a guest, frequent guest of Fox news and a fan of Fox news. So this is not

01:20:49.580 like a bunch of Fox haters. Glenn is on Fox all the time. I worked for Fox for 17 years, but

01:20:54.600 you know, there's a lot happening right now. We need to be honest about it. Uh, he's up next.

01:21:00.560 Federal regulation in terms of what's allowed on air and what isn't. And when you look at what

01:21:06.840 Tucker Carlson and some of these other folks on Fox do, it is very, very clearly incitement of

01:21:14.440 violence, very clearly incitement of violence. And that is the line that I think we have to

01:21:21.900 be willing to contend with. She's an idiot. She's an absolute idiot. She's a congressional 1.00

01:21:28.020 Kardashian. I've said it before because it's true. There is nothing close to incitement in

01:21:31.980 anything that Tucker has done. Absolutely. Nothing. Nothing. She doesn't understand the

01:21:35.180 meaning of the word incitement is when I issue a statement so incendiary that it spurs immediate

01:21:42.220 action, causing somebody to harm somebody else. Where do you do that? What do you say? Show me

01:21:47.740 the statement. Show me who got hurt, when, where she doesn't know. She makes shit up all the time. 1.00

01:21:53.320 Uh, and now she's saying it publicly, but she is definitely not the reason Tucker parted ways

01:21:57.280 with Fox news, because if there is one person in this world, Rupert Murdoch does not listen to

01:22:01.840 it's that moron. Welcome back to the Megyn Kelly show here with me now, as we go through this

01:22:06.380 massive breaking news about Tucker Carlson leaving Fox and less massive, uh, Don Lemon fired by CNN,

01:22:13.820 Rich Lowry, editor, uh, and chief of national review. So. Well, that's a congressional Kardashian

01:22:21.800 with the congressional spelled with the K cause he, yeah. Yeah. Thank you for picking up what I'm

01:22:27.460 putting down. Um, I want to add this Brian Stelter. I'll actually have to figure this out. I can figure

01:22:33.480 this out when I'm off the air, but he's tweeting out. I'm told that both Tucker and Don Lemon have

01:22:39.520 retained the famously aggressive entertainment lawyer, Brian Friedman. I've reached out to

01:22:43.380 Friedman, Friedman, uh, no response yet. Brian Friedman is my lawyer. And I would submit one of the reasons

01:22:49.400 why all these people now run to Brian because he represented me so well in my fight with NBC

01:22:54.760 and absolutely crushed his job. Crushed it. Okay. Brian Friedman is an amazingly talented lawyer

01:23:02.400 and you should be running to him if you get in any sort of a legal dispute because he's awesome.

01:23:08.060 So we'll see, uh, how that goes. And, um, I'll get back to you when I have news on that

01:23:13.620 Newsmax CEO reacting to the news, Chris Ruddy saying, quote, this is again, per Stelter for a while.

01:23:19.180 Fox news has been moving to become establishment media and Tucker Carlson's removal is a big

01:23:24.700 milestone in that effort. Millions of viewers who liked the old Fox news have made the switch

01:23:29.800 to Newsmax and Tucker's departure will only fuel that. I, I recognize Ruddy's got competitive reasons

01:23:36.980 for saying that rich, but he's not wrong that this is a good day for Newsmax.

01:23:41.780 Yeah. I don't know how much of a good day it is for, for Newsmax, but this was stunning news.

01:23:50.040 Obviously I was at the heritage foundation 50th anniversary dinner on Friday and Tucker was the

01:23:55.920 featured dinner speaker and it may have been the best after dinner remarks I've ever heard. And I've

01:24:01.340 heard a lot of them and a lot of them aren't very good. It was, he was just winsome. He was funny.

01:24:07.060 He was memorable, had profound moments. He's just incredibly talented communicator and no one else,

01:24:14.760 whoever they get in that slot, obviously is going to move news, create news almost every night the

01:24:20.440 way Tucker Carlson did. But Fox is a, you know, it's a juggernaut. They are very good at TV, better at TV

01:24:27.680 than any of their competitors. So I think they'll be fine, but it's definitely a blow as Glenn was saying

01:24:33.180 for a populism. Even if the, the APM new APM person is a dyed in the wool populace, no one will be as,

01:24:42.220 as good at, as advancing that point of view and make it matter as much as Tucker did.

01:24:47.120 I mean, Fox, look, they had, when I left, I, I, O'Reilly was in the eight and I was in the nine.

01:24:53.720 I left, they did just fine. Now that was right as Trump took over. Uh, and they put Tucker in my slot.

01:24:59.080 So he crushed it. Um, and then eventually I can't remember if they put him there and then

01:25:04.200 they moved him to eight when O'Reilly left. But when O'Reilly left, a lot of people thought

01:25:09.800 that that slot would collapse. Then they moved Tucker to eight. It didn't collapse. It did better

01:25:14.320 than ever. So there's like Fox does have a machine going. And I think they learned the lesson that

01:25:18.800 they can have their biggest stars go and the juggernaut will continue. But I predict they're

01:25:23.840 going to take a hit as a result of this. I think Tucker's core audience is going to be angry and

01:25:29.460 they're going to try to send Fox a message. So I, you know, I don't know about long-term,

01:25:34.220 but I think certainly short-term Fox is going to take a hit on this. Um, I will say this.

01:25:40.060 When Tucker first started in that ATM slot, there was someone at Fox who was very skeptical.

01:25:45.080 And I was like, ah, you know, I saw him at a party or something. It's like, oh, the first week

01:25:49.900 ratings were, were okay. Right. You know, like O'Reilly ratings, just, just wait, just wait,

01:25:54.360 Rich. It'll come down. And of course it never did. Um, and the secret sauce to the Tucker's 0.95

01:26:00.600 show was one, having original thoughts being, being new and different. I didn't like some of that

01:26:05.380 difference, but also just being a fantastic writer. Some of those opening monologues,

01:26:11.320 you could print them in a, in a magazine or a newspaper as an op-ed and they'd stand up.

01:26:15.820 They were just so well done. And I think Glenn, and you were also right that, uh, you know, when

01:26:22.820 Tucker, you know, he was ousted at MSNBC and CNN. And I remember him saying, when he started Fox,

01:26:27.460 well, I've exhausted all my alternatives. Well, there's no exhausting the alternatives now,

01:26:30.880 right? You're not dependent on three, uh, cable networks or a couple of broadcast networks to have

01:26:35.720 a huge platform. And he clearly has the potential to be like a Joe Rogan type podcasting behemoth,

01:26:42.880 uh, given, given his, uh, his loyalist and his, his native talent.

01:26:48.620 He could go all subscription and do that. Subscription's harder to do because you're asking

01:26:53.540 people to pay money out of their pocket as opposed to an ad supported show, but he'll find

01:26:57.180 advertisers too. I mean, the people who, Steven Crowder has lots of advertisers. Uh, Ben Shapiro

01:27:02.280 does. I do. You can say controversial things in this world and they're great, awesome advertisers

01:27:06.440 who will have your back and they're not afraid of the mob. So I think he'll do very well here.

01:27:10.580 I want to bring you this report from mediaite, which is of course a website that covers our

01:27:14.440 industry and, um, very well connected. They report as follows. Tucker Carlson's departure

01:27:19.500 from Fox news was not voluntary. Multiple sources told mediaite a source who spoke with mediaite

01:27:25.020 on condition of anonymity revealed that Carlson was in fact shocked by the news. He was totally

01:27:29.800 surprised. Quoting said the source, he had no idea it was a firing. The source added and Carlson

01:27:35.620 quote was informed today explaining why he had closed Friday show saying he would be back on

01:27:40.400 Monday. The Fox news newsroom is quote in a state of shock. The source said confirming

01:27:45.940 reporting by mediaites, Aiden McLaughlin, that multiple sources within the network said the

01:27:50.260 news quote hit like a bomb inside the network, shocking even staffers close to the X primetime

01:27:55.160 host who had no idea this was coming and found out not from any internal communication, but when

01:28:00.380 the news broke online, the source did not know the precise reason for Carlson's firing, but

01:28:05.220 speculated that it was part of general house cleaning after the dominion settlement, plus the

01:28:10.660 grumbling and litigation worries from Fox news shareholders or something related to former Fox

01:28:15.700 producer, Abby Grossman's complaint that was specifically connected to Carlson. Um, that's all

01:28:23.360 kind of interesting, but also suspected. Um, I do think it's stunning to me that I just don't know

01:28:31.460 what would make you fire Tucker Carlson other than the board making you saying we're, we were getting

01:28:36.880 hit with shareholder lawsuits. Now we're facing a smart Matic lawsuit and whether he's the cause of 0.85

01:28:41.460 our troubles with dominion, PS, he wasn't, or these other things are not, we're tired of it. And, uh,

01:28:47.280 he's, he's got it. Like somebody had to somehow strong arm because I just can't imagine Rupert Murdoch

01:28:52.060 bowing to the AOCs of the world saying he does incitement every night.

01:28:57.760 Mm-hmm. Right. Well, you know, with, when Roger was running the show, he would, he would occasionally

01:29:02.680 yank the primetime talent around just to, to show them who was boss. There was none of that, uh, um,

01:29:08.260 lately and especially not with Tucker, you know, he seemed totally immune, uh, from, from anything.

01:29:13.840 So this makes it completely shocking as, uh, that's just the only appropriate word. And I kind of

01:29:20.160 thought, you know, all right, you've lost this big lawsuit and paid, or settled this big lawsuit

01:29:24.660 and paid 700 million. You can keep Tucker Carlson. Now you don't have to worry about it. So it's just,

01:29:30.180 uh, it's, it's stunning. Um, maybe there's, there's something else floating around and that,

01:29:35.020 that Abby Grossman, is that her name? I'd be shocked if it's the Abby Grossman complaint. I mean,

01:29:40.560 it's true. Do you know how many, how often Fox gets sued? Gross bird by, by disgruntled ex-producer.

01:29:46.240 I mean, that's like a day ending and why? Yeah. It's like the, the 1927 New York Yankees firing

01:29:51.780 Babe Ruth or Lou Gehrig. It's just hard to fathom and we need to know more. Um, I want to give you

01:29:57.480 some reaction from the right. Eric Trump tweets out first. It was Laura Trump did not realize that

01:30:03.200 his wife, Laura got the boot from Fox, but apparently that happened in December. Then Don Bongino. Now

01:30:08.100 Tucker Carlson. What is happening to Fox? Uh, Carrie Lake tweeted out the best decision I ever made

01:30:14.180 was leaving Fox. She was a Fox local anchor in Arizona. Good for you, Tucker Carlson. You're free

01:30:18.380 and uncensored. Um, Yashar Ali, who is a reporter who has a lot of media sources, total and complete

01:30:25.860 shock at Fox in response to the Tucker Carlson announcement per text from staff and talent,

01:30:29.480 everyone outside of top executives, including Tucker staff found out about his exit on Twitter.

01:30:34.300 No internal email was sent. That still remains the case. Um, I have lots of friends inside Fox who

01:30:39.800 send me the stuff and nothing's come out from Fox internally to the staff yet, though they did put

01:30:44.720 out this anodyne statement. We've agreed to part ways. We thank him for his service to the network

01:30:50.660 as a host. And prior to that, as a contributor, his last program was Friday. Now we'll have rotating

01:30:55.160 hosts in his slot. We've agreed to part ways. Let's just, uh, get the audience up to speed.

01:31:00.980 That's joining us now. And Don Lemon unbelievably Don tweets out the following. I was informed this

01:31:06.380 morning by my agent that I've been terminated by CNN. I'm stunned after 17 years at CNN. I would

01:31:12.320 have thought that someone in management would have had the decency to tell me directly at no time.

01:31:16.140 Was I ever given any indication that I would not be able to continue to do the work I've loved at

01:31:19.520 the network. It's clear that there are some larger issues at play. That's interesting. It's clear that

01:31:23.780 there are some larger issues at play. That's a lawsuit, uh, hint, right? Right. But it's like larger

01:31:29.500 issues besides you. Like what, what does that mean? And then he goes on to think his, his colleagues,

01:31:34.120 then CNN just added this rich to the conversation. Don Lemon statement about this morning's event is

01:31:39.200 events is inaccurate. He was offered an opportunity to meet with management, but instead released a

01:31:45.260 statement on Twitter. It sounds like perhaps that opportunity was offered after his agent told him

01:31:51.660 he was canned. I can't quite tell what went down there, but your thoughts on Don Lemon done after 17

01:31:56.700 years at CNN. You know, he's, he's a smooth talker. He's blibb. He's, he's good looking,

01:32:02.280 but if you're going to have a new CNN, how can you keep Don Lemon? I mean, he was all in on the

01:32:08.040 anti-Trump stuff. He knows nothing. He totally is a representative of the conventional wisdom at any

01:32:14.860 given moment. And if you really want to be a news network, you have to get away with it from that. I

01:32:19.280 don't know whether CNN ever actually will manage to escape the gravitational pull of that, but he wasn't

01:32:25.300 a natural fit in the morning show is shoehorned in there to give him something. And obviously seems

01:32:31.040 to have some deep issue with women. If he doesn't, he just didn't like his two women co-hosts very much.

01:32:37.300 We saw reports behind the scenes of that, and we saw the evidence in front of our eyes and just

01:32:43.540 morning TV. You at least want a, uh, people to be a fake liking each other. You don't have someone

01:32:48.840 want someone to be a bitchy towards his co-host, uh, every other day. And that's what you got. 1.00

01:32:54.140 So it seemed, it seemed inevitable. This, this is not shocking. Um, we, on our podcast a couple

01:32:59.960 months ago, went around predicting whether Don Lemon would still be there in six months. And

01:33:04.260 most of us said no. And I said no as well. So this is one of my rare predictions that actually

01:33:08.960 panned out. And Charlie said no, but you won't give him credit for it on the next editor.

01:33:15.000 I was right. I don't know about anyone else. I'm onto your, your patterns. Rich Lowry. Thank

01:33:20.120 you. Great to see you. Thanks very much. Just getting some more reporting in Semaphore,

01:33:26.980 which is a new news agency run by the guy who, uh, Ben Smith used to run Buzzfeed. Um,

01:33:32.920 they're reporting that Tucker's EP executive producer, Justin Wells is also out at Fox news.

01:33:38.200 Uh, look, all we know for sure is that they did do a hit piece, uh, with Ray Epps on Tucker on 60

01:33:48.340 minutes last night. And it would have been very on brand for Tucker to respond to that today. So

01:33:54.860 whether that was the catalyst for getting rid of him, uh, I cannot tell you, but for sure, I mean,

01:34:01.720 you can take it to the bank that there was some rumbling internally about that today,

01:34:04.920 but even if that were the last straw in Fox's view, it's stunning to me that there would have

01:34:11.700 been any straws on that camel's back because Tucker was number one. And he was the man who brought

01:34:17.920 all sorts of buzz in about Fox news into the papers. Yes. Often negative, but that's going to

01:34:22.980 happen. How many nice pieces did you see on Bill O'Reilly when he was there? Go check my media matters

01:34:28.200 write-ups when I was in the Fox news prime time. There's a whole website called. I hate Sean

01:34:32.500 Hannity.com, right? That's the, that's part of the job. Uh, so I don't know. I will say this,

01:34:37.680 uh, about Don Lemon now variety reporting in the wake of his unacceptable sexist comments about

01:34:44.920 Nikki Haley, you know, about women being in their prime only when they're in their thirties,

01:34:48.560 maybe 40, his fate at CNN hung in the balance with many colleagues privately calling for his

01:34:54.180 ouster. So we don't know how much things had ratcheted up internally there for Don Lemon and

01:35:00.640 whether even that exchange, I just showed you that he had with Poppy Harlow at the end of last

01:35:03.900 week's program. You know, he was on very thin ice, I'm sure in the wake of Nikki Haley and all the

01:35:08.920 other incidents with him. What a day in cable news. Look, it's a very fickle business. You really are,

01:35:14.100 you know, the, the bride one day, the bridesmaid the next day and then divorced altogether the day

01:35:18.720 after that. But there is a wonderful life after cable news. And I say this to Don Lemon too. You know,

01:35:23.660 I'm not a fan. I've never made a secret of that, but there is life after cable news that having lived them

01:35:28.340 both is so much better than life inside the cable news machine. You are free. You can craft your own

01:35:36.800 show the way you want to and see if it connects with an audience. And if it does, you can count

01:35:40.980 yourself as one of the luckiest people alive because you get to do the news, which you love

01:35:44.580 in the way you want to do it. So welcome tomorrow. Vivek Ramaswamy.

The Megyn Kelly Show - April 24, 2023

Tucker Carlson Exits Fox News, Don Lemon Fired by CNN, with Glenn Beck, Glenn Greenwald, Rich Lowry, and Steve Krakauer ｜ Ep. 535

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