White House: Tucker Carlson Is Not Credible

The White House on Wednesday spoke out against Tucker Carlson's depiction of the Capitol attack, joining top Republican senators and the chief of the Capitol Police in condemning him for downplaying the violence. Unusually, the White House specifically called out Carlson by name in what Politico sees as a possible "escalation of tensions." Spokesperson Andrew Bates said the the White House agrees with those "who have condemned this false depiction of the unprecedented, violent attack on our Constitution and the rule of law." He added: "We also agree with what Fox News’s own attorneys and executives have now repeatedly stressed in multiple courts of law: that Tucker Carlson is not credible."

Bates cited lawsuits including the defamation case from Dominion Voting Systems, in which Fox exec David Clark testified that he doesn't consider Carlson's show a credible news source, though his viewers might. Thomas Manger, the Capitol chief, said Tuesday that Carlson had "cherry-picked" calm moments from more than 41,000 hours of footage to present a misleading version of events. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre also spoke out against the host Wednesday, the Guardian reports "To have said what he said when we saw police officers lose their lives is just shameful," she said during the daily briefing. (Court filings released Tuesday revealed that Carlson told a staffer he hates Donald Trump "passionately.")