Home Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) joined different Republican leaders in criticizing Tucker Carlson for his interview with white nationalist Nick Fuentes, saying it was a “big mistake.”
The remarks from Johnson, who made them in an interview with The Hill revealed Tuesday, have been a firmer condemnation of the interview than he’d made weeks earlier.
“I spoke briefly with Tucker about that, and I think it’s a responsibility. He has a lot of listeners, and I think giving Nick Fuentes that platform is a big mistake,” Johnson stated.
“We should not be giving a platform to amplify those views. And I think that’s important for us to say,” he continued, describing Fuentes’ rhetoric as “vile, terrible stuff. I mean, it’s not just antisemitic, it’s openly racist, it’s violent — things you can’t even repeat on the House floor.”
Johnson raised some issues about Carlson’s Fuentes interview earlier this month in an interview with The Nationwide Overview.
“I don’t think — whether it’s Tucker or anybody else — I don’t think we should be giving a platform to that kind of speech,” the Home speaker stated, including: “He has a First Amendment right, but we shouldn’t ever amplify it.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and former Senate Majority Chief Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) have additionally spoken out about Fuentes’ interview with Carlson, who let most of the white nationalist’s most egregious remarks go unchallenged.
“Last I checked, ‘conservatives should feel no obligation’ to carry water for antisemites and apologists for America-hating autocrats,” McConnell stated final month, borrowing phrases from Heritage Basis president Kevin Roberts’ protection of Carlson. Roberts has since stated it was a “mistake” to defend Carlson over the interview.
“If you sit there with someone who says Adolf Hitler was very, very cool, and that their mission is to combat and defeat global Jewry, and you say nothing. Then you are a coward, and you are complicit in that evil,” the Texas senator stated on the time.
He later stated his Republican colleagues, even when they opposed Carlson’s interview with Fuentes, have been too “frightened” of talking out “because he has one hell of a big megaphone.”
President Donald Trump, in the meantime, dismissed the criticism of Carlson earlier this month, saying the ousted Fox Information host has “said good things about me over the years” and that folks should make up their very own thoughts about Fuentes, an individual who has repeatedly praised Adolf Hitler.
“If he wants to interview Nick Fuentes, I don’t know much about him, but if he wants to do it, get the word out,” Trump stated. “People have to decide.”
