Fox's 'emotional' miscalculation in firing Tucker Carlson

FPI / May 2, 2023

“Fox fired their number one host for being too Christian,” The Daily Wire's Matt Walsh observed.

A Fox News insider revealed to Vanity Fair that the top reason that Carlson was sacked by the network was because of an address that he gave to the Heritage Foundation on April 21 in which he praised God and rejected Satan.

Regarded by some an an aristocrat and despite an upbringing in an affluent California home, Carlson's unchallenged authenticity nevertheless radiates an unabashed enthusiasm for founding American values now considered gauche by the powerful elites that govern public discourse in the United States.

“God, spirituality, and prayer” are reportedly all subjects that “freak out” Rupert Murdoch, the insider told Vanity Fair on the condition of anonymity.

Carlson's address at the Heritage Foundation’s 50th Anniversary gala was the last straw for the Murdoch clan and led to the termination of his contract, the Vanity Fair report said.

Carlson told the Heritage Foundation audience during his address that the struggle for the future of America will be a conflict between “good” and “evil.”

“We should say that and stop engaging in these totally fraudulent debates…I’ve tried. That doesn’t work,” Carlson declared. “I have concluded it might be worth taking just 10 minutes out of your busy schedule to say a prayer for the future, and I hope you will.”

“That stuff freaks Rupert out. He doesn’t like all the spiritual talk,” according to Vanity Fair's source.

Since the news broke that the network was "parting ways" with Carlson, Fox News has refused to elaborate on the motive behind the firing.

Gabriel Sherman wrote for Vanity Fair: “Rupert Murdoch was perhaps unnerved by Carlson’s messianism because it echoed the end-times worldview of Murdoch’s ex-fiancée Ann Lesley Smith.”

WorldTribune.com reported on April 26 that Murdoch had called off his engagement to Smith after she had called Carlson a "messenger from God."

Sherman added that Smith had started reading passages from the Book of Exodus during a dinner at Murdoch’s Bel Air vineyard where Carlson was present.

“Rupert just sat there and stared,” the source said, with the report suggesting that one of Murdoch's motivations for canning Carlson was to remove his ex’s favorite host from the air.

Historian and conservative commentator Victor Davis Hanson said Fox News miscalculated in its "emotional" firing of Carlson.

"The Murdochs are not quite understanding that when you take away somebody who had a greater potential elsewhere and was a precious asset that anchored your whole evening lineup and you fired him in a fit of pique, or anger without thinking it through, you've got to be very careful, because you're not going to be able to replace a guy like that," Hanson told The Telegraph's "Off the Script" podcast this past weekend, warning the modern media is "fragmented" and allows many big names like Joe Rogan, Bill O'Reilly, and Megyn Kelly to make their own way without corporate media.

Hanson added: "A lot of people are very angry about it" and tuning out of Fox News as it turns left under the growing influence of Lachlan Murdoch.

"Tucker was able to stop the hemorrhaging from One America News or from Newsmax or all of the right rivals," Hanson said, hailing Carlson as "responsible and learned but still can appeal on the same topics" that appeal to the anti-mainstream media crowd.

"So, I don't know where they get that person, and I think that in the immediate week, it shows," Hanson continued.

There has been a ratings crush on Fox News, and networks like Newsmax have taken advantage and will continue to do so, Hanson added.

"There's a big vacuum now," he said. "'There's a 3.5 million person audience and we're going to go after it.'"

Here is Carlsons’ 36-minute address to the Heritage Foundation in full:



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