The recent breaking news of popular Fox News host Tucker Carlson leaving the news platform has been taking the world by storm. Carlson had joined Fox News in 2009 as a contributor and later co-host of Fox and Friends Weekend from 2012 to 2016. His night show, Tucker Carlson Tonight debuted in 2016 and since then has gotten a massive following, averaging about 3 million views nightly. However, as popular as his show may have been, it has also sparked various controversies due to demeaning comments about women, people of color, and immigrants.
Some of the ideas presented on and supported by Carlson on his show include downplaying the severity of the January 6 attack on the Capitol and claiming that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and that Donald Trump was the real winner. This has garnered him a lot of backlash, even from Republican Senators such as Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Kevin Cramer of North Dakota. All of these instances of misinformation blew up into a $787 million defamation lawsuit against Fox News by Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion Voting Systems sued over Fox News making claims about election fraud for the 2020 presidential election. The lawsuit was recently settled for $787 million dollars and following that it was announced that Tucker Carlson would be leaving the news platform. “FOX News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways. We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor,” Fox News said in a statement.
This announcement has left a lot of people puzzled as Tucker Carlson was a high-ranking individual with the organization. However, Carlson is still in hot water for numerous reasons. Texts to his staff from January 2021 stated, “We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait,” and “I hate him passionately” in reference to Trump. This led to a rift between him and Trump but later it was revealed by Carlson that him and Trump apparently reconciled. A more serious accusation against Carlson and several others within Fox news was made by Abby Grossberg, his former senior booking producer, who filed a lawsuit regarding sexism and harassment. Grossberg highlights two instances in her lawsuit: 1) mocked-up photographic images depicted then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “in a bathing suit revealing her cleavage” and 2) staff members being polled on two separate occasions about which of the two female candidates for the Michigan gubernatorial election they would rather have sex with. Tanvir Rahman, one of Grossberg’s lawyers, stated, “Tucker Carlson’s departure from Fox News is, in part, an admission of the systemic lying, bullying, and conspiracy-mongering claimed by our client,” in response to Carlson’s departure from Fox News. Grossberg’s own response to Carlson’s ouster is “This is a step towards accountability for the election lies and baseless conspiracy theories spread by Fox News, something I witnessed firsthand.”
Tucker Carlson isn’t the only TV personality to be let go by their news media. Don Lemon, an anchor on CNN, was also fired after 17 years with the company. Lemon was let go after multiple accounts of misogyny such as claiming women past their 40s aren’t in their prime and thus should not hold public office in reference to presidential candidate Nikki Haley and other similar accounts. The ousting of Don Lemon and Tucker Carlson is a crucial step in the process of accountability, as people who have a huge platform to outreach to the public should use this power responsibly.
