Tucker Carlson, the top-rated host at Fox News decided to part ways with the network. The abrupt departure of the controversial prime-time figure came a week after Fox News reached a $787.5 million settlement with Dominion Voting Systems over the network’s promotion of former President Donald Trump’s false 2020 election claims.
That bombshell settlement which is the biggest media payout in history prompted many to question if Fox Corporation chairman Rupert Murdoch would make major changes at the network.
It has come to light that a text message sent by Tucker Carlson set off a panic at the highest levels of Fox on the eve of its billion-dollar defamation trial showed its most popular host sharing his private, inflammatory views about violence and race.
Tucker Carlson’s texts alarmed FOX
The discovery of the message contributed to a chain of events that ultimately led to Carlson’s firing. In the message, sent to one of his producers in the hours after violent Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Carlson described how he had recently watched a video of a group of men — Trump supporters, he said — violently attacking “an Antifa kid.”
It was “three against one, at least,” he wrote.
And then he expressed a sense of dismay that the attackers, like him, were white.
“Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously,” he wrote.
“It’s not how white men fight,” he said. But he said he found himself for a moment wanting the group to kill the person he had described as the Antifa kid.
For years, Mr. Carlson espoused views on his show that boosted the ideology of white nationalism. But the text message revealed more about his views on racial superiority.
The text certainly alarmed the Fox board, which saw the message a day before Fox was set to defend itself against Dominion Voting Systems before a jury. The board grew concerned that the message could become public at trial when Carlson was on the stand, creating a sensational and damaging moment that would raise broader questions about the company.
The day after the discovery, the board told Fox executives it was bringing in an outside law firm to conduct an investigation into Carlson’s conduct.
