Chris Cuomo
2024-03-11 01:59:03
The Tucker Carlson Show is your beacon of free speech and honest reporting in a media landscape dominated by misinformation. The only solution to ending the propaganda spiral is by telling the truth. That's our job. Every day. No matter what.
So here we are on a Wednesday and Chris Cuomo is sitting in my living room. Now, why is Chris Cuomo sitting in my living room, formerly of CNN? Well, I'd never met Chris Cuomo before today and of course, for years I was incredibly mean to Chris Cuomo on TV. Why? I can't really say now.
But I'll say this, he was one of the very first people to call me, completely out of the blue, no idea how he got my number, after I left my job last spring. And that began a series of conversations, very long conversations, in which I discovered that Chris Cuomo is a really interesting person. And though we disagree on some things, we don't disagree on everything at all. And I thought, wow, I wonder how many other people like Chris Cuomo are out there. People I have dismissed or mocked because we disagreed on some things, who actually, if you got to know them, you might learn something.
So that might be a useful exercise. And so with that, a conversation with Chris Cuomo begins. Chris, thank you for coming. So one of the reasons I think that you called me was because we'd had such similar lives, and you're one of the few people who kind of understand. And both of us, spent decades in one world, were exiled from it.
And I think the question is like, what if we learn from this? You first.
I'm still trying to figure it out. And I knew it was important to reach out when you were going through your exit, let's call it. And, because I knew the pain of it and I knew the challenge of it. And everything is different, but I do believe that one of the lessons I've learned is you have to think about how other people are being affected by situations, especially once you have pain in your own life. And it doesn't matter what you agree with, what you like, what you don't like.
It's all gotten so far removed from humanity that the idea that, I don't like, that Tucker Carlson takes a bite out of my ass on his show.
I think you have a good reason not to like me. I think that would be fair.
But that means that this is not somebody who you should care about as a human being. And I feel like our culture isn't working anymore. That everybody retreats with their own. And, as a result, everybody is against one another for the same kinds of reasons. And it's not working.
And if it's not working, then why aren't we trying something different? Why wouldn't I reach out to somebody who has a family and who has a following and is dealing with a hard time to see if I can help and see what's going on in their life and what they're about. And I was concerned about calling you at first because I thought you might be thinking that this is like a spite phone call or something. You know what I mean? Or be like, why are you calling me?
What do you want, a gloat or something? I didn't want to make anything worse for you.
But, as you say, there's such tremendous power in conversation.
Yes.
We only know what we're told about people and the snippets that people want us to see, and the context. And I'm not saying that you're one benefit of context away from never saying anything that I don't think you should say. But what is lost by doing this? What is lost by this? How can this not be helpful?
To sit across from somebody and talk to them instead of about them.
So, of course, I couldn't agree with you more, which is why we're here. And I think both of us have tried to talk directly to people that we disagree with legitimately on some things, but because it's a really useful and important experience. So why doesn't it happen? It does make you kind of wonder. maybe there are forces trying to prevent those conversations.
And what's the motive there?
I call it the game. You and I have been in the game for a long time. And, whether you like it or not, whether you mean it or not, you wind up playing the game. You can, especially with the platform that you had, you wind up essentially picking sides. And you wind up having agendas either that present themselves to you or are foisted upon you.
But either way, you wind up in the same place. And in doing that, it becomes habit. It's what people are celebrating around you. It's what you see around you. People start to come after you.
Now you have a natural enemy. These people, I'm resistant to them because they're attacking what I'm saying and they're getting it wrong, or they're getting it right, and I still don't like it. That's the culture, and that's what the media enforces. We are not supposed to be doing this. I am doing something bad right now, not just wrong.
This is bad. Like morally bad. I am giving a platform. That's the new word for censoring, right? I'm giving Tucker Carlson a platform.
I'm talking to him about who he is and what he's about, and why he does what he does. Why? He's bad. And that's the end of the analysis. But look where it's gotten us.
Nobody talks to each other anymore. You've got politicians resigning because they say, yeah, it turns out nobody really wants us to do anything here, but fight, and I've kind of had enough, I'm going to go. I mean, whoever thought we would see any of this, and yet nobody's trying to remedy it?
I think it's really hard. And the one way in which I really sympathize with you, and I said this in public at the time, is that you were attacked, and I don't know the details, I'm not going to ask you to reveal them, but it felt like you were fired because you remained close to your brother, who was governor of New York, and he was going through a bunch of stuff. He left office and you were still talking to him and you weren't allowed to. And my take on it from a distance, knowing neither you nor your brother,
was. you've got to stick with your brother.
He's your brother.
And that obligation supersedes all others, because that's your family. That's like a moral obligation. If my brother committed triple murder, I'd be against triple murder, but I would never abandon my brother because he's my brother. And so anybody who says your obligation to me overrides your obligation to your own brother, that person's evil. That's how I feel about it.
And I felt like they were doing that to you. That was just my perspective from watching.
People feel differently about family, which was somewhat of a new concept for me.
In what way?
I had a big shot media person say to me in an interview on their platform, I would not have helped my brother. Not if it would have conflicted with my ethical obligations as a journalist.
Or your career ambitions is what they're really saying.
Disgusting. Either way. And I said, well, first of all, it didn't because I didn't cover my brother's situation on my show. I've never had the audience give me a hard time until they started hearing things in the media that didn't square with what they had thought. But look, we...
Can I say, whoever said, I don't know who you're talking about, it could have been any of them, because they all have the same view, but they're the moral criminals. as far as I'm concerned. If someone is going to say, I would sell out my brother because my boss wanted me to, what do you just listen to yourself? Like. that's the ultimate betrayal.
Look, people can have their own ethics, their own morals, their own standards.
Well, I'm going to judge the crap out of them.
Knock yourself out. For me, it was more, I got myself into a situation I didn't see coming.
And I thought, and my therapist like laughs when I say this. He lived with me all through this. He's been like a life coach to me for a really long time. Great guy in my life. I never say his name because he'll lose all elevations if anybody knows that he's working with me.
But he was like, what do you mean? you didn't see this coming? The media was all over, your brother. They wanted him to go down. They wanted you to go down.
They hated what was happening during the pandemic, with you having him on the show and all the admiration you guys were getting. This is a jealous business. And I hear that. I understand it, but I don't want to accept it. And what I have decided was, look, I didn't have any control over how getting fired happened.
All I control is what I do next. And I tried to get myself into that place. And that's what made me call you. is that that was so hard. It was so hard for me to see all this stuff that I had worked so hard on and I valued so greatly, just vanish.
And well, now, what am I? And now, what do I do? And now is it over. for me? Like, is that it?
I'll never be number one on a huge platform again. So what am I about? What do I do? Of course, like you, I love my wife. I love my kids.
I love my family. I love the family that I choose, my people, I'm there for them. I'm a great friend in crisis. Great. I'm not great when things are good, but I'm a great friend in crisis.
And I had to really think about things I'd never thought about before. And I wanted to check in with you about that to see how you were negotiating that space, because it had been so painful. But when I met you, and you know, you should, we should talk about this. You were not the way I was. You were ebullient.
You were laughing. And you were, yeah, well, let me tell you, it was a favor to me. And this is going to be okay. I'm going to be fine. This is a weird world.
And now I know things I didn't know before.
Yeah.
And I thought that that was a real blessing for you. What did you figure out that you didn't know before?
Well, I sort of, I mean, I'll just say,
you know, I loved working there. I was there 14 years. They were always nice to me. They never told me what to say. So it's not an attack on them to say that I was hemmed in by the fact that I worked for someone else.
And that's just the nature of the relationship. No matter how free you think you are, part of you is assessing like, well, I actually am an employee. I do have a boss. And I knew that they disagreed with me on a bunch of big topics. And, to their great credit, they never tried to change my view on those topics.
And I would say that now, you know, even though I'm not there anymore, good for them. But you aren't fully free if you work for someone else. Like. that's how I felt about it. And I just had reached this time in my life where I feel like there's all these really important things going on.
I want to be as honest as I can possibly be at all times. And that was a hindrance to me. So I, and I also had this kind of supernatural sense that everything's going to be fine. And that in the end, you know, you die anyway. So what are you afraid of exactly?
And I'd also done it for too long, you know, too long, too long, same gig. It's good to be, and I had been fired before a couple of times. So it's good to be fired because it brings you low and you don't become the overbearing asshole that every TV person is on some level. I mean, I already am that, but I kept it in check a little bit. Public humiliation is really important for a man.
I would recommend it to all men. And so I was very happy from day one, but it was a different, maybe a different time in my life or something. You know, I was ready for it.
Everybody who I reached out to about you said, you know, he's changed. He's different because of this. And when I spoke to you recently, not in the beginning, but recently, you said, yeah, I'm not that guy anymore. What does that mean for you?
Well, it's just, I mean, I had been, I don't think I was playing a role ever. I was definitely used by your former employer and mine, CNN, to flack for the Iraq war. And I allowed that without even really knowing what was happening. And I was always bitter about that in the way that you are when you've done something wrong. In other words, if you fight with your wife and it's a hundred percent of her fault, you're not that mad.
But if it's really your fault, then you're extra mad, because you're mad at yourself. And I've been mad at myself for 20 years over the things that I said and was pushed into saying, promoting the Iraq war, which is totally indefensible in my opinion. Now, so, but other than that, I have always, I think, been myself. But I just, you reach a stage in life where I don't feel like I have anything to prove and I don't need to be nasty to people. I've done that.
I have a PhD in it. You were probably the last person I was really, really nasty to.
Sorry. You got an A in that class, you bastard.
So I don't go into things. Like. I just talked to Putin and everyone's like, you gotta be rough on Putin. Actually, you're not my boss. I can do whatever I want.
Yeah, I can go in there and tell Putin, you're a monster. Okay. What do we get out of that? So I can like prove that I'm a tough guy. I don't need to prove that.
I'm not insecure about that. I'm tough enough anyway. So that, you know, I just don't have a chip on my shoulder at all about any of that. I just don't care. I've got nothing to hide and nothing to prove.
And I just want to hear people talk, because I think it's interesting. I think it's important to hear people talk. And so I can kind of pull myself out of it more than I was able to before. If you're 31 and trying to make it in TV, you know, you're sort of, you're itching for a confrontation to show your skills.
I can win.
And now it's like, nah, I've done that. I just, I'm not interested in that. It's totally pointless. I don't elicit any interesting information. It's all about me and my performance.
And I know you know what I'm talking about, because you've lived the life, but there's a lot of pressure on you to make a moment. And now I'm just like, I've had a lot of moments. You can look up on YouTube if you want.
So do you feel that?
when you look at how you used to do it versus how you're doing it now, was it a function of? this will work? How much of it was, this is how I feel, and how much of it was, this will be funny or this will resonate, this will land, this will get clicks or likes?
No, it's not that. No, I mean, I've always been an instinct player, 100%. And the only times I've gone really wrong, as with the Iraq war, was when I suppressed my instincts and joined a herd. That was really the last time, 2002,, that I did that.
Now, if somebody gives you that answer, you know, the follow-up is, what do you mean? You're a big boy. You're a smart guy. You're supposed to be an intellectual. You got duped by people in a newsroom to be for a war?
I got duped by someone in the Bush administration.
Ah, so it wasn't CNN.
It was not CNN. But I was on a show that was inherently partisan, left versus right, Republican versus Democrat. Yeah, yeah. And the Republicans were in favor of invading Iraq, and the Democrats were opposed. Now, of course, it's inverted completely.
But at the time, that was, so, there was. on the one hand, I didn't want to be on the same side as like Barbara Lee of Berkeley.
I'm still not on her side on most things. And on the other side, I had these people from the Bush administration saying to me, actually, we have a lot of intel that we can't give you, but it's totally real. And my question, my questions, are always the dumbest possible questions. It's like, what does Saddam have to do with 9-11?? Right.
Like, what? Right. Like, explain to me, so I can understand. They're like, look, we can't really tell you. So I just went along with it.
Anyway, it's not that interesting. I think a lot of people did the same.
It was a big deal, though. Not you making a misjudgment.
Yeah, a million people died. Right.
But it was such a big deal because it changed things. One, Congress would never own violence again. They would never vote. As the Constitution demands. Oh, yeah.
They gave it to presidents. Oh, yeah. Right and left. And anyone's going to take the power, right? You're in the power game.
You're president. You want to give me power as Congress? I'll take it. And we saw it with Bush. We saw it with Clinton.
We saw it with Bush. We saw it with Obama. They all take the power.
But you give up the power. It's like...
You'll never get it back.
You'll never get it back.
And they don't want it back. They won't even redo the AUMF. So what changed?
Then you're a bitch. I'm sorry.
Well, you can call it that way. You have no self-respect. Again, the benefit of not having a boss. But what changed? The dynamic?
one was Congress isn't going to own their responsibility anymore. They'll let the executive go with it. And if the president screws up, it's on them. And if it goes well, we all win. Great.
Second thing that changed was it started to be okay to give bullshit rationales for military action. Oh, yeah. Because 9-11, we went into the wrong country. And everybody was so angry that if you tell me the guy who did it is in there, I'm not asking any other questions.
Oh, we would have been made in Italy. Oh, for sure.
And if we had had these, then, we would have what we're seeing in the Middle East right now. And what's happening in this country, where people would be like, whoa, what are you doing in Fallujah? What are you doing in Mosul? Wait, where are the bad guys? You know, who are these people?
But they didn't have the exposure. So that really was a very formative experience for us. Have you felt it?
I mean, you must have felt it over the years, something big happens?
My professional life.
. And the team has a view? Yes. Oh, yeah, yeah. Look, I am what they call hard to manage, okay?
And that used to bother me. I used to be like, no, I want to be a team player. I'm a team person. I like being part of a group. I like that.
And I'm not hard to manage. I just want to know why you want me to do what you want me to do. I'll do anything. I'll go anywhere. I'll put myself in any kind of danger.
If I think it's important for people to understand and I have the ability to go and they don't, I'll go. But I want to know why. I want to know why it's worth it. And, you know, some people, they don't like the questions. Just do what I told you to do, meat puppet.
You know, this is your job. As you go where I tell you to go. This is what we're going to do tonight. Stop asking so many questions. I get that.
I get why that would be frustrating for a manager. But now I embrace it. And people who know me know it's coming from a good place. I'm not a diva. I'm not difficult for no reason.
I just want to.
. I have such a strong sense of purpose. And living through. 9-11.
taught me such hard, bad lessons about, holy shit, you're supposed to check power. You got this totally wrong. You did not go after these people the way you were supposed to. And you didn't do it for the wrong reasons, which were, one, you were covering it, right? And so, you know, you're kind of into the continuation game.
And the American people didn't want you checking it. Do you remember?
Are you speaking of the Patriot Act specifically?
Well, no, before. When Bush said, hey, stop asking all these questions about the weapons of mass destruction and the yellow cake. You're starting to create bad conditions on the ground for our fighting men and women. And the American people stopped watching the news. And I remember.
I was at ABC. And they stopped watching because it seemed like we were jeopardizing our troops. And it worked. And everybody pulled back on that. It just covered the war.
And we all went in our embed training and everybody went over there and did it. And I never forgot that. And that's why I'm always chasing members of Congress about something that everybody thinks is a stupid in the weeds issue, which is, hey, why don't you do a vote on this? Why don't you vote on what we're giving Israel? Why don't you vote on what we're giving Ukraine?
Why don't you vote on what we just did when the Houthis were attacking us? Why aren't you voting on that? Why didn't you vote on when Trump bombed in Syria? Why? That's not a part of America.
It's not an immediate interest for us. that's personal to us and our safety. I'm sure it's strategic, but that's not what the War Powers Act is about. That's not what the AUMF is about. That's not what the Constitution is about.
And they always brush it off. They always brush it off because that's where we are now. We are stuck in a game that's about nothing but advantage.
And I had time to think about all this when I got shit camped and to go back and look at what I had been about and what I had done and what I had not done. And if I were going to come back, because, you know, you're tougher than I am. Not physically. I would literally twist you like a bandaid. But you had more resilience about this than I did.
I still feel like I'm on one knee in getting back up. And what motivated me to come back was two things. Three things. One, my wife told me I had to. Two, you know, she was like, you got to get up.
And, you know, we got kids. You got to get up. You got to do something with your life. that is helping people and making something of this place. That's what we're supposed to be about.
You are not about that right now. You are a space rug right now. That's what you are. You're a 230-pound lump on the floor. Get up.
Do something with your life. Okay. So, was that your response?
Okay.
My response was, get away from me and my bottle!
More Costa Migas, please! There's more!
My response was that I was embarrassed and I knew she was right. But sometimes you know what's right, but you don't have the energy, the will, or the self-confidence or belief to do it. So, if I were going to get back into this, because there's such a price for entry. And another thing, you know, I was thinking when I was walking around outside, you've got security outside your house. And I was thinking to myself, God, I know what this is about.
You know, and your kids are older, lucky for you, but they're still aware. They're still exposed. And I put my family through so much that I didn't understand that I was doing at the time because I had blinders on. Got to help. Andrew.
This is wrong. I got to help. I wasn't thinking that my son was having to deal with stuff. My daughters. My daughter making up accounts online to defend her uncle.
Killed me. My wife. So, dealing with all those things. And it's fine.
First of all, good for her.
No, they're good kids. They're good kids. They got a good genetic selection. They got a couple of my good genes and they got mostly their mom's. So they're in good shape.
But I said, I want to come back. I want to do this. But I know why now. And I'm only doing this job, the way I want to do it. And what I think matters about it.
And if that's not good for my employer, then I'm done. And I have the podcast. I'm building the podcast. My own platform. I'm going to talk to who I want about what I want.
I'm going to focus on what I think matters. And I'm not playing the game. I'm only going to expose the game. And the reason that this is wrong is because everything is about silos and sides. And people will say, no, no, no.
There's a line. And Tucker has crossed that line. And I will say, yeah, says, who? Says you in the media, who also cast me out? Not the millions of people who want to take it.
Well, that makes it even worse. No. It means that he, you already have a platform. You already are relevant. Why wouldn't I want to understand this person better?
when you have the reach that you have? It doesn't make any sense. Except, if you're just playing a stupid game that has rules about who you're supposed to like and who you're not supposed to like. And I'm not going to be there for two reasons. One, it's a stupid game.
And two, I lost that game. So I'm not going to advance something that I thought was dirty when it was done to me. And I don't think there's value to the American people. They don't know what to believe, because nobody ever shares ideas. And, you know, we can go through different stuff that I say, that you say, because I still want to know why you came after me as much as you did.
Because I'm a dick.
Probably.
Because it was easy.
Because I don't like CNN and I really mean that in my heart of hearts. I really just don't.
But why me?
I don't know.
How can you not know? It was so intentional. It was so frequent. Because people kept sending me.
videos from Instagram. You.
It was me. It was you.
I sent him the first video and then he was done.
But what was wrong with me? lifting weight?
You're an outdoorsman. But I just couldn't. I mean, I was pissed about the COVID thing. That is totally true. I didn't buy any of this from day one.
That was totally real.
But that's not, what I did was not really a pure refutation of your positions on COVID. It was me taking the cheap shots, which I'm not always above. But you should be. You should be above that.
Did it feel good when you would come after me like that?
It felt a little dirty.
It felt a little dirty. Dirty good? Or dirty dirty?
I'm not really a dirty good guy. You know what I mean?
Because you enjoyed it. Let me tell you. There was no shame in your game. where I move into the room.
and his cameras aren't picking up all the people sitting here.
I mean,
in the sense that, you know, I don't want to use any kind of sexual metaphor, but there is one for this. It's like something you shouldn't be doing, but there's kind of the animal thrill of doing something wrong. I guess, is what I would say.
You loved it. You loved it and it worked for you. But I will say this, I will say this. And my in-laws watch you.
Do you know?
how hard it is to deal with having your in-laws enjoy a joke that makes you want to, you know, do bad things that are going to cost you civil litigation money?
Somebody did say, you know, Chris Cuomo is a lot bigger than you. Maybe you should be careful. I just couldn't, you know, I almost, I have weaknesses. I will say, I don't think I have a weakness for women. I gave up drinking many years ago, but I still, I'm still beset by the weaknesses of the flesh, and one of them is mockery.
I just can't help it. And my wife, I will say, who you were just with, is an unusually good person and would always say, I don't like it when you're mean. You're not a mean person. You shouldn't be mean. Ugh.
And I'm very dependent on my wife's approval. Like, I'm totally happy to admit that. And she never criticized me, but she, in a gentle way, like, I don't like it when you're mean. That's not who you are.
It's kind of who I am. That's the problem.
But I'm watching your stuff now. You know, I watched a lot of your stuff for this and it's a different vibe, Tucker. I mean, look, if we had been in more contact before you did the Putin interview, I would have told you, you got to check some boxes with this guy. I get, I get why you're going to say, I'm not going to get there and get into a fight with a guy who may not let me out of the country. No, no, no.
I was never afraid. I was afraid of the U.S. government, not of Putin at all.
Of them doing what?
Arresting me when I got back for a sanctions violation. That's what my lawyers told me. If you go talk to Putin, and if you don't ask him tough questions, the Biden administration very easily arrests you. It's a big law firm that told me that. A big law firm.
One of the biggest law firms.
But how bullshit is that?
I thought it was, and I was like, I don't care. I'm an American citizen and I'm going anyway. But I felt no threat whatsoever. I definitely felt threat.
You know, when this story came out, that they had arrested somebody in Russia? Mm-hmm. That got like no attention. One of the things that you have to know about this guy, which I didn't believe, but now I do, because I've been looking around this house like a little snoop. You don't watch TV and you don't pay attention to your social media about what's being said about you.
No. That's why your hair is so full and so rich in color.
No, I know who I am. I don't need to be told by people who don't know me.
So you don't monitor it?
Not at all.
You don't know, unless somebody tells you? No.
I never in my old job, my executive producer sitting right there, I never got the ratings. Ever. Ever, ever, ever. I don't want to know the ratings. I wasn't on the email list.
I don't do email, actually. And so, no, I don't want to know that because I'm-.
No social media. How am I doing? How is this getting picked up or not? You don't do it?
I don't watch myself on television, or on tape, or whatever it is. And I don't-.
And you don't look at comments? No.
Why would I? Look, I have a big family. My immediate family, which is large, and then a large extended family with whom we're very close. And so I immediately get word if I'm doing something that offends them, which is not very often, but I have. And they'll tell me immediately.
And so that's what I care about. And I care about, you know, my religious faith. But why would I care about some commenter? I just don't. And, by the way, I think it's really wrong to do that.
Why would you give emotional control to a stranger? Like, don't do that.
Because we are-. Well, look, you've gone on your own now, so it's different. The metrics are different. But for a pawn like me, I am somewhat at the mercy of how people decide to feel about me.
No, but you- Once you self-liberate or you liberate yourself from the completely irrelevant opinions of partisans and strangers and focus only on the people in your world who God has put right in front of you, then you're completely free. And then it's like, well-.
But our business is all about it. It's totally incestuous. But you do better in the business. And it's dependent on social media as a proxy of Vox Populi. They believe that's the people speaking.
Right. But not caring is, as a practical matter, much more effective. Because then you don't have any voices in your head other than the ones who matter.
Yeah, until your boss picks up the phone or the comms person picks up the phone and says, we've got to clean this up. These people are not happy online because you used the word mouth breather and it turns out that that's a form of a breathing thing that people are upset about and you have to apologize.
The sleep apnea lobby is mad at you.
Whatever it is. And, you know, you're like, oh, okay. And you look online and it's only 400 people who said this randomized thing. But it now matters. The media has made it matter.
Now the Washington Post calls and says people online are upset at you.
like, if you think you can host a TV show, why don't you? Okay? But actually you're working in the PR shop at some, like, depressing company. Like, you don't know anything. And if you think you're better at my job than I am, why don't you do it?
You know? But they can't. And so, their whole justification for their sad jobs, at which they're not very good, is to make you feel insecure. And I just, I'm not interested in playing along. Like, why would I care about some 32-year-old, unhappy, unmarried PR person?
It's like, the single dumbest, most insecure group in America. I get it. And they're like, oh, you gotta do the New York Times Magazine. How about no?
Like, no?
You know what I mean?
Hey, it's Kimberly Fletcher here from Moms4America with some very exciting news. Tucker Carlson is going on a nationwide tour this fall. And Moms4America has the exclusive VIP meet-and-greet experience for you. Before each show, you can have the opportunity to meet Tucker Carlson in person. These tickets are fully tax-deductible donations.
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Hey guys, Josh Hammer here, the host of America on Trial with Josh Hammer, a podcast for the First Podcast Network.
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I get it. I get the turning yourself off to criticism, although I think that's harder to do than to say.
Not criticism. If my wife looks at me cross-eyed, she'd bring me to my knees.
I'm saying social media criticism and the others.
Yes, irrelevant criticism. Why wouldn't you do that? Because it's actually really dangerous? not to. It is.
I always think this. It's giving a toddler a handgun. I'm a gun person. I shoot a lot. I'm totally for guns, but not in the hands of people who don't know what they're doing with guns, who are irresponsible because it's too much power, right?
And it will be misused. And the same is true with opinions and letting them in to your head. Keep all of that stuff out and just follow the voice. And the more quiet you are, the clearer the voice is.
I want to talk to you about where that takes you in terms of what you're doing and how it's the same or different for me. But I've got to tell you, on one level, now that I know that you are not responsive to the external in terms of social media, the masses, that makes you coming after me as much as you did. even worse, by the way. Because it's not like. you were part of some feedback loop where you were like, man, this is reading.
I've got to keep doing it. It was just you.
It was. And I try never to be passive, aggressive. I really pride myself on just aggressive.
Yeah, I'll give you that.
And not passive aggressive. You know, I'm a man, okay? There's no excuse for passive aggression. But in some sense, that was, I'm not just saying this to spare your feelings, but I mean it. It was passive.
Spare my feelings. Spare my feelings.
I'm trying to explain. So it was, I think, so little of Jeff Zucker, who I texted immediately when he got fired, though, on principle. But I worked for him and I just, you don't have to comment, but I really have a low opinion of Jeff Zucker. I don't think he's a good person and I mean that. And a lot of people up and down management at CNN, I know personally since I spent years there, and I felt very hostile toward them and to some extent it was like my passive, aggressive way of, I mean, you were the biggest show of, you know, striking out at CNN.
I'll tell you something. One, and people always say I'm saying this gratuitously, but why would I at this point? Zucker is the best maker of television I've ever worked with. And he gave me all the opportunities that put me in a position to succeed. He would not let me go back at you, by the way.
Wow.
He would not let me do it. He said, one, that's not what we're about here. And where's it going to go? Where's it going to go? You say you want to be trying to be in the arena to make things better.
Now, this is the man who fired me. I have a lot of feelings about that.
I will say when one of your co-workers, and I cannot remember his name, but he's a very weird guy who did the media show,
Brian Stelter.
Stelter was about to attack my children and called and told me that. And I threatened him and called him names and all this stuff. And I called him a very bad word. And he called my employer to complain that I was a sexist because I called him this word. Anyway, it was comical, but upsetting.
I didn't want him to attack my kids. So I did. I called Zucker on his cell and I said, one of your guys is about to attack my kids. And he goes, oh, can you shut it down? So here I'm saying, I don't like Zucker.
I appreciated that.
What the voice tells you to do. I don't disagree that sitting across from Putin and getting into a shouting match or whatever is going to bear much fruit for people. I understand that. And I get that it's a commodity in the media, but I get that it may not be the highest good.
Well, it's also just vanity. It's vanity. Right.
I'll give you that. There is an aspect of it. But you made choices. You didn't ask him about Navalny. You said, well, all killers, all leaders kill.
But don't you feel that if you are going to go and sit with someone like that, you have to hold them to account for things that matter?
I did.
Like the fact that he may have murdered somebody? Or a lot of people?
Well, I don't.
. I mean, the Ukrainians say that he didn't kill Navalny. So I think it's...
Well, who killed him? then? Guy looks good one minute, the next minute he's dead?
I mean, in some larger sense, the Russian government.
The Ukrainians say they don't. Zelensky says he killed him.
No, he doesn't. No, the Ukrainian government said, no, he died of natural causes. Now, what is actually going on there? I can't even guess. Okay?
Navalny died in the middle of the Munich Security Conference, also in the middle of the debate over Ukraine funding in the United States. And his death was within hours used by the President of the United States to justify another $60 billion. So those are just facts. I haven't the faintest idea. Putin put him in prison.
Okay? So there's that.
So in some sense.
He's responsible. Here's what I learned, and I'm hardly a Russia expert, is this is an extremely complicated political environment. Extremely. Like, next level. Okay?
These are the people who dominate world chess. And so their politics are incomprehensible to me. So what's actually happening... I mean, I've been in a lot of countries and covered a lot of stuff abroad. And the one thing I've learned is you actually don't really know what's going on.
And so I had a bunch of Navalny questions to answer your question in my 4,700 questions that I'd written out. And I decided, on the fly, not to ask it because I felt like,
what about Navalny?
Well, whatever he's going to say, I'm not going to move the ball at all. There's a war going on that is resetting the world. I'm not for throwing your political opponents in prison. I hate it. I'm mad that the Biden administration is now doing it.
I'm worried about it happening to me. I mean, honestly. I want to get that on the record. So I'm not for that in any sense. I don't choose to live in Russia.
I'm not a Putin supporter. But there's a war going on. And it's crushing the United States economy. And most Americans don't understand that. And I just want to, I want to talk about that.
And so I made that decision.
Crushing the economy is not crushing the war economy, though. A lot of that money winds up coming back to the uniparty, the corporations that do that.
Rich, no, I totally agree.
They always find a way to win.
Kicking Russia out of SWIFT, stealing people's stuff, the oligarch stuff. A lot of these people had nothing to do with the invasion of Ukraine. That's not the rules-based order, actually. That's the hardest-edged possible politics being played by the U.S. government, using the U.S.
dollar and the sanctions regimes to do it. What is the message to the rest of the world? Get the hell away from the United States. These people, if they elect somebody who's senile like Biden, or someone who doesn't like us, they will use the dollar and sanctions to destroy us. Get away.
It's not a safe haven anymore. And so that fact will change world history, change the course of American history. We're going to live with that for the rest of our lives. Our grandchildren will live with it. I don't think Americans understand that, and I want them to.
And I want to hear what Putin's thinking is. And I don't know if I achieved that or not, but that was definitely... But what I didn't want to do is try to convince other journalists, for whom I have no regard at all, for the most part, that I'm a good person. I don't care what they think of me. They call me a Nazi all the time, which I'm not.
So their views are totally immaterial. I just want to focus on what I want to focus on, and if you don't like it, don't watch it. That's kind of my view.
I agree that every time you go into an interview, one, look.
You hear voices in your head,
though, like, you've got to do this, you've got to do that. No, I don't. I can do whatever I want. The first blush of it was, Carlson doesn't get to interview Putin. That I absolutely disagreed with, and, in fact, as much as it pained me, I defended that proposition, that, of course,
Tucker Carlson,
if he can book Putin, he can interview Putin. That's how it works in our business. If you can get him, you can do the interview. Why Putin chooses Tucker Carlson, what Tucker does with the interview, we'll judge when he does it.
So I was abroad, and, as noted, not kind of obsessively following the coverage of myself. I don't have a Google alert.
They didn't want you to do it because they thought that you would be a stooge for Putin, and then you showed up in Moscow.
I won't even be here in five years. None of these people, John Carl and all these people,
they'll all be gone. But you make it easy for them. You show up in Moscow. You say, this is the best place I've ever been in my life. This city is better than anywhere in America.
It is.
Get out of here. On what basis?
It's so much better on the basis that I described.
You're people making, like, no money. That's why the prices are cheap.
Yeah. Well, actually, look, I'm no expert on the Russian economy. I can only tell you what I saw, which is a city of 13 million people larger than any, much larger than any city. we have. Hard to govern a city like that.
And there is, you know, no homelessness, no graffiti. It's spotlessly clean. The public spaces are beautiful. The architecture has not been degraded by postmodern, the oppression of postmodern architecture, which is designed to demoralize and hurt you and destroy your spirit. I believe that because it's true.
Do you believe that postmodern architecture is designed to kill people?
Why? What's the message of it? Well, look, anything that we make with our hands, it's the purest expression of our creativity. So, there's a purpose behind everything that we make. There's a message behind all of it, as there is in all art.
You don't paint a painting with no vision behind it. You paint a painting because you're saying something. And so, buildings that are warm and human and that elevate the human spirit are pro-human. And brutalism, for example, are the I.M. Pei glass boxes that crowd every city in the United States.
Those are not elevating. What's the message of working in a cube in a room with a synthetic drop ceiling and drywall on the walls and fluorescent lighting ahead of you and no privacy at all? What's the message? The message is really clear. You mean nothing.
You are replaceable. You are a widget in a bin awaiting assembly. You're just a cog in a machine. You have no value. And everyone kind of ignores this and is like, oh, well, that's the way buildings have always been.
No, that's not true. And architecture and anything made by human hands is the purest expression of the society that produced it. So we were like, oh, they're handicrafts. No, they're not handicrafts. They're a visible and tangible sign of who you are, not just as a person, but corporately, as a society.
And if you live in a place that creates nothing beautiful and doesn't provide people uplifting buildings to live and work in, that's a very sick and dark society. And it wasn't always that way. That's the only point I made. Look, Moscow, I'm not moving to Moscow. I'm an American.
I'm never leaving. But Moscow is not so different from the cities of the United States. in my youth. We had a free society, much freer than we have today. We had much more capitalism, free markets, free monopolies.
But you're not saying, Moscow was a free society.
I'm saying. the United States was a free society. The country that I grew up in had a semi-functioning capitalist system with competition. It wasn't all four companies dominating everything, which is what we have now. That's not capitalism.
Okay? That's a monopoly economy, which is bad. And you had freedom of speech. I guess there were probably some limits, but I wasn't aware of what they were because they were so broad. And you had safe, for the most part, clean cities.
And that's exactly what Moscow is. So, again, as I've said, and I really mean it, and I said it to our producers who we were traveling with at the time, this does not make me love Putin. It makes me despise our leaders. And so I say this for Moscow. and John Stewart is just such a tool of power.
It's crazy. He's like, well, you know, fentanyl ODs are the price of freedom. Really? You're going to try and convince me of that? It's like telling women working at Citibank is liberation.
No, it's slavery, actually. That's not liberation. Getting to raise your own children is liberation. Getting to do what you want to satisfy the deepest desires of your heart, that's liberation. They've redefined liberation.
Liberation is living in some shithole? No. That's slavery. And so I try to make this point. I don't think it's super subtle or esoteric or complex, but they're like, oh, tool of Putin.
No, no, no, no. You are flakking for the indefensible. That's what's actually happening.
So, for you, it's not Putin's better, Russia's better. It's that it gave you perspective on what you think has changed in America for the worse.
Of course.
I look at everything. It's not how it came across.
Well, I'm sure. I'm sure it was, at least in part, due to my inability to explain it fully, which has been a problem all my life. It's incumbent on me to explain things. That's my job. And I don't always succeed.
So I'm willing to believe that. But it's also a product of intentional distortion of what I'm saying, which is, this is an indictment of our leadership class, which deserves to be indicted and imprisoned, in my opinion. And I mean that. So all my views are that. All my views are through an American lens.
I've got a big family. I'm not leaving. My family's been here for hundreds of years. I'm not going anywhere. I'm the most American person you've ever met.
Don't have another passport, unlike a lot of other people. And so I'm stuck here, by choice and circumstance. And I want my country to be as great as it can possibly be. And that's why I opposed the Ukraine War from day one. This is not going to help us.
Period. And they're like, oh, tool of Putin. It's like, no, tool of America. That's what I want to be.
What about the argument that they make that if you allow Russia to exercise reach, it'll keep doing it?
I would say, show me the evidence. I would say, show me the evidence.
Started in Crimea. Now they're taking at least half of it.
They had a referendum in Crimea, where they asked the overwhelmingly, like 90% Russian population of Crimea, do you want to be part of Ukraine after the coup of 2014,, or do you want to be part of Russia? And they said Russia. So that's the democratic process, I would say, there.
Right, but you don't change sovereignty over what the popular vote is. Well, it depends.
how committed to democracy you are. I mean, democracy is the promise of self-government.
But if, where we are right now, decided it wanted to be its own state, they don't get to just go. No, because it wouldn't be... you have larger ideals involved.
Sure. But as a matter of principle and practice, if you're committed to democracy, you should let people choose how they seek to be governed. But the truth is, Ukraine is not a sovereign country and hasn't been since at least 2014, when the West, the CIA, and this has been documented in great detail, staged a coup with a color revolution and took over their government. And now we know all the details that, you know, we have bio labs and CIA offices, and it's not a sovereign country in any sense. So whatever.
I mean, look,
I don't even care that much. Do you know what I mean?
It's heavy stuff, though.
It's very heavy. I mean, of course I care, but I care in the sense that, if, you know, Burundi invades Rwanda, which has happened, or Vietnam invades Cambodia, which has also happened, I'm against that because I'm for sovereignty. But what I care about is the country that I live in. I want it to be a sovereign country. It's not.
We act at the behest of the demands of other countries. We imperil our own national security on behalf of other countries. That's why we're in NATO. We have a security guarantee with Macedonia? What?
I didn't sign up for that. That's not in the Constitution. I want my kids to die for Macedonia? No.
But their rationale is an extension of collective strength. Now, here's the problem. I don't have any problem with you owning any of these opinions. That you do. I can have my own opinion about the level of sufficiency of your reasoning.
But.
I think you'd find it unimpeachable.
It's that.
. Oh, it's definitely not unimpeachable. I get it. But it is that you shouldn't be demonized for it, though. And to flip it, because your audience is going to very much want to understand this.
What do you believe personally, or do you believe people believe that I say or report or represent that I shouldn't?
That you?
Yeah, like COVID, for instance. What do I mean to you when it comes to COVID that bothered you about the coverage or the reality, or any of it?
I was completely opposed to, from the very first day, the idea that you can restrict people's freedom of movement or force them into taking any medical treatment of any kind. Period. And I am strongly, and have been really my whole adult life, opposed to abortion, which I think is killing. It is killing. However, the one abortion slogan I always liked was my body, my choice.
I thought that was a good argument. I don't think it's actually your body, so I don't think it's a rational argument if you think it through. But as a slogan, I totally believe it's my body, my choice. And the my body, my choice. people are like, actually, no.
It's not your body or your choice. It's my body and my choice, and you're going to do this or we're going to hurt you. And I'm just completely opposed to that. And so, anybody who seemed to be endorsing it, as you did, I was like, completely opposed to that.
I understand. And I've heard this. I see reproductive rights differently. And I do think that it was a very dangerous, politically, it's an easy analysis of the dog catching the car and getting rid of Roe v. Wade.
Now you have it state by state. You have this IVF thing that happens in Alabama. You're going to have a lot of crazy stuff happen now and women are going to have to pay the price for it. But, here's where I was coming from on COVID, and I want your take on this. So, we're in this emergency situation that I very much believe was real.
And I wanted to believe, President Trump, that this is being hyped and it's going to go away. There's going to be a few dozen cases and we'll be okay. I would have loved for that to have been true. I didn't want people to get sick, let alone me.
so then it becomes like a really big thing, and I have these unusual set of inside eyes, right, because my brother is running one of the biggest states and dealing with some of the most cases. So, I'm like deeper into it, probably than anyone else covering it in the country, because I'm watching my brother get overwhelmed by need in the hospital. That's how I got. COVID was going to visit hospitals because I kept hearing these stories about all these dead people all over the place and how there were gurneys flying all over and they were. And then I wound up catching COVID.
The government says this is what we have to do and there are similar practices going on around the world. I understand the restriction argument. I totally get the liberty argument.
but.
why was it wrong for me to say this is what they're telling us to do? And clearly it's imperfect. All of their answers are imperfect. They don't know what's happening right now. This is a first.
But isn't that the job? Is that? this is what they're saying? Here's their explanation? Yes.
Asking questions about it?
That's part of the job.
But I wasn't like pro-vaccine or pro-mask. I'm the guy who got busted in the New York Post because I took a run without a mask. on, walked back in my lobby and somebody ratted on me, and then I became a hypocrite. I want you to wear a mask, but I'm not. Not.
when I'm taking a run. I'm coming back into my apartment building. I'm sweaty.
I get it. I didn't wear a mask.
You came after me for that.
at all. I did, and I'll tell you why. Please. I didn't wear a mask at all. And that's one attack that I will not walk back, because I think it's fair.
I didn't wear a mask, and when told to do it on airplanes, I always punched a hole through it.
At a spike?
No, because I couldn't breathe, otherwise I can't get the cigarette in there if there's a.
Yeah, that's right. Just kidding.
No. I quit smoking by then, but I couldn't breathe, and it's not good not to get oxygen. I believe in sunshine and air. My wife and I have not slept with our door closed in, I mean, many, many years. No matter what the climate.
We sleep with the door open because we believe in fresh air. And so I believe that and no one's going to keep me from getting fresh air. Sorry. So, but if it's true that you must wear your mask at all times, then you must wear your mask at all times, whether it's inconvenient or not. Don't go for it.
Well, it wasn't all times. It was a social distancing thing and I had been jogging.
But people are getting arrested on the beach alone.
I understand that it went too far. What I didn't understand. It's insane. I totally get it, and I feel the same way about the vaccine and what was understood and not understood.
Wait, but can I just ask you one question? Please. It really was the pivot point for me when I realized these people are liars and it's my job not to affirm what they say, but to question and to challenge them, no matter what they call me. And they called me a murderer and all that. But when the BLM riots happened and public health officials said it's okay because fighting systemic racism, which they never defined despite my request, is more important than shielding people from COVID.
And I'm like you may think that as a political matter, but as an epidemiological matter you just revealed that you're a freaking quack and you don't give a shit about public health, because you were just telling me that this is not allowed except when it's a militia helping you. You're an evil person. That was like my initial... And no one ever explained to me how it's okay to infect people with COVID as long as they're challenging Donald Trump.
I understand the argument. I guess the way I was watching it in real time is well, they can't control... If it's a protest, it's one thing and you can have rules, but do you really want to go arresting your way into a crowd of people who are already outraged by something? Let alone if it becomes... on a beach.
Surfing. I know, but people... Look and I don't like that. But... And I didn't like it then I never said I did.
If a bunch of Nazis came out in the early summer of 2020 and said we're Nazis.
I don't think they would go mask arresting, although a lot of those guys do wear masks to hide their identity. Are you kidding? I don't...
They would get mowed down.
I mean.
. I just think it would be too dangerous and I think they felt the same way about those protests.
Well, they've got drones and automatic weapons like they.
. Look, the one thing we know about the people...
But you're not going to shoot these people. you know what I'm saying?
They shot Ashley Babbitt you know she was 5'2 and unarmed, you know like and then no one apologized for it.
Tucker. They shot Ashley Babbitt. What was she doing at the time?
She was pushed against a door going into the Senate chamber, but she was killed without warning and no one ever said maybe we shouldn't.
. I'll just start here from my perspective don't shoot girls. That's like my rule. You don't commit violence against women period. I actually...
I'm the last person, apparently in America, who thinks that. An unarmed woman should not be shot under any circumstances, unless... If she's unarmed and she's 5'2. I think it's totally dishonorable and to see Joe Scarborough of all people, of all people, saying that's okay, I'm like... Oh!
Look, I mean so many of these situations are just so impossible.
But I'm getting off the track. Sorry, sorry.
No, I think this is the track, because the whole point is nobody has these conversations. Yeah. No one... Now they do. in their real lives.
People have friends where they don't agree on things. Trump has changed a little bit. The MAGA stuff changed a little bit for people. They started being mean to each other in their personal lives.
but.
. Yes.
It's like the worst.
thing that's happened.
You've got to talk like this. Like I... Do. I see it the way you do? No.
I think you do.
on some level. Hold on, hold on. I don't believe that you should... Shooting unarmed people is a very dicey proposition.
Women, women.
I don't make a gender distinction. Really? I know too many women who can kick my ass. You know what I mean?
I don't think you know a single.
. That's not true.
I do.
Name one who could kick your ass. So I'm 6'1", or was before I had back surgery.
I was going to say. Yeah. We're trying to be real with each other here. You know what I mean? You're a lot taller.
than I am, okay? I'm just saying. And you're famously a bodybuilder. There's not one woman in America who can kick your ass. It's just not true.
And you know it's not true. And you have to say it.
to make the unhappy, unmarried.
. You went to the UFC fight. You think you could get in there with the women who were fighting and come out looking like that?
No, I'm saying you specifically.
Yeah, I'm telling you.
I have a polygraph exam and I don't want to have to do this on camera, okay? But if I applied it to you...
I would pass in flying colors, because I know how to beat the test. And I can tell you how, if you want to know. That's why they're not admissible in court.
But can I just ask you? You know in your heart you don't actually think there's a single woman in this country...
No, I really do.
What's her name?
I really do. I know. The whole point is that I don't have to know them by person.
Men and women are very different. Much more different. We spend all of our time on racial differences. Your race. My race.
And there are differences between races. There is no difference between races. that's a quarter as profound as the difference between sexes. These are biological differences that are physical, they're psychological, they're hormonal. Well, that's kind of the profound difference.
But that's kind of the point about drawing racial distinctions is that you're really the same. That's my point! And obviously biologically you're different. But I'm saying I don't see it as a less than. Can women lift as much weight as men on average?
Of course not. No, no, no.
I'm making the opposite argument. It's not less than. I like women better. And I think that my job, all of our jobs as men, is to treat women differently, comma, and better than we treat men. That is the idea.
Oh, that's chivalry. Okay, honey. Good luck in a world without it. And I'm serious. If you got into an argument and I know you well enough to know if you're standing in a restaurant and someone's like fuck you, Chris Cuomo you'd punch him out.
If a woman did that.
It depends where my cash flow is. I really don't have a lot of capital.
right now. You would want to. You're quick with the punches.
I would definitely want to.
I happen to know that. If a woman got way up in your face, I wouldn't. Exactly.
I wouldn't.
Exactly. So. it is a bigger sin, not just against her, but against yourself and your dignity and your responsibility as a man.
Your job is to protect women. I'll give you the gender. I don't see it exactly the same way. Because you don't want to admit it.
You're telling me.
some girl is going to kick your ass. if you know that's not true. Hold on. There are women who could. Who are they?
There's no question in my mind. There are all these professional fighters and women who train in self defense who will beat my ass. I'm a 53 year old guy.
How many female fighters have gone against male fighters that are roughly the same age? Very rare.
Although, did you see that girl who just won the high school wrestling championship?
That was cool. She was in the body.
It was lightweight.
They're extraordinary.
female athletes. It's unfair. By weight and muscle.
It's not just unfair. It's immoral. It's totally wrong.
I don't know that it's immoral. If a woman feels... It's not immoral.
then why do we have a violence against women's act?
Why do we specify in law that it's worse?
Hold on. There's a through line. You have violence against women because you have a cultural.
preset of victimizing women and putting them in positions that are inferior. And it was important enough that society decided to punish it extra.
No. It's not the. it's illegal to be, as you know, fair to women act. It's not the illegal to.
Should be.
Maybe. You should have that also. Maybe.
Because there's gender inequality.
But it's the violence against. violence against.
because you have a culture of where men you know what the rule of thumb is? The rule of thumb comes from British common law. You can beat your wife with anything that's not thicker than your thumb. It's a stupid culture.
The British Empire is the empire that stopped widow burning in India. There was no force for female liberation more powerful than the British Empire. Ever. Until the American Empire showed up and inverted it and started telling women true liberation is working for some soulless company that hates you and will pay for your insurance to freeze your eggs so you can put off what you really want to do in life and work for us.
That's not. Liberation is choice. Is that you get to make your own choices. people don't make them for you.
Uh, huh. Well, Did you just blow off my point? Well, I did to this extent. Of course, liberation is choice. But these are choices that individuals don't get to make, like how's your economy structured?
And, as Elizabeth Warren, There are structural.
things that take away your choice.
That is true. I think the inability to raise children on a single income is like the biggest change in American society.
But when you propose something like family leave or allowing men or women to be able to be there with the newborn, nobody wants to give them money for it.
Allowing men to be there with the newborn? Yeah. Huh.
Other countries. Why? You didn't spend time with your kids when they were first born?
Of course I did. And I have a lot of children. But I so I know for a fact, not as a matter of theory, that a child needs two parents and that each parent brings something vital and but different to parenting. But the one thing I definitely know is that there's not one man on the planet who knows intuitively what to do with a newborn. There's a period for the first several months that if you're not a woman, you are not comfortable making the right choices for a newborn.
That's just true. And if you can find a man who's totally comfortable around a newborn, the way any five-year-old girl is, then I will give you a thousand dollars. Because you can't. It's like finding the girl who can beat you up. You can't.
Yes, I can. Because there isn't one. I'm telling you. And so the truth is the difference between.
men and women.
no one wants to admit it, because we're like.
oh. It's not that. It's totally that. I'm telling you.
Our whole conversation is we're like in a hammerlock. There's a tiny percentage of the U.S. population, which is an overwhelming percentage of the Democratic electorate, which is unhappy unmarried women and they control what everyone can say. And they don't want to have the conversation. and they're like oh, you hate women.
I hate women. I don't think I do. The people who think it's okay to punch them in the face, the people who don't punish rapists, the people who allow you to be afraid on the subway, those people hate women. The ones who are telling you forgo your family to work at Citibank, those people hate you. Obviously.
There are definitely people that hate women. There is a real thing. There is definitely a cultural problem we have in terms of allowing.
We love you so much.
allowing women to have the same exercise of options that men have. And we know this. And there are different ways to correct it, and sometimes you go too far and in the wrong directions. But I don't think there's anything wrong.
But it's always the same direction. It's always the give up your family. If you read any survey of women, what do they want? They want a lot of different things. We all do.
But men want that too. Didn't you get married to have kids?
No. You didn't want kids?
You didn't want to start a family?
Not really, no. But I got engaged at 21..
Yeah, you were very young.
Yeah, I was super young and I was also.
And you guys had been together.
Well, I was also especially shallow. And I got married because I really liked my wife and I thought she was hot. And so I married her and she was the one who was like we should have children. And I was like, whatever. It's not even interesting.
Well, she had to be thinking what am I going to get out of this?
I'm a Christian, so I'm stuck. But this is not what I thought.
I think there's possibly some truth to that. But the point is, if you ask women what they want, the overwhelming majority will say I want to be married and have children.
You don't think men want that also?
Yeah, they may do. I mean I did and ultimately That's why I got married. 100%. I'm talking specifically about women. They want to be married and have children, and that is the thing that the Democratic Party prevents them from having through policy.
And the reason they do that is because the single most important constituency, as you well know, is not black voters. they always say this black voters. No. It's unmarried women of all races. And so they do a lot of different things to discourage marriage and fertility.
One of them is paying single moms not to be married. Another is constantly promoting anti-fertility measures like abortion and birth control. They actively work to prevent women from forming families. And I think that's evil and I don't think it serves women at all. That's my view.
It is your view. I disagree. I see it differently. But that doesn't make you evil. You see what I'm saying?
Maybe a little evil. No. And I'll tell you what you use that word a lot. I don't use it.
I do happen just.
You are more judgmental and stronger in your convictions than I am.
Yes.
I have a lot more latitude in how things go. Like Ashley Babbitt. look, the whole thing was so regrettable. And I didn't think it was right. It wasn't right to call it insurrection, because an insurrection is a real thing, and I know people get mad at me about this.
Who gets mad at you about that? Just tell me some names. Is this the girl who's going to beat you up? who's getting mad at me? There are a lot of women.
I'm telling you, Tucker, I'm going to start bringing them around you the next time we see each other. I'm afraid of these chicks. And you will see. You went to that UFC fight. If you had said this before and then walked into that fight, Trump even couldn't have saved you.
So this is what I saw there. Insurrection is a crime. Okay. There's an insurrection act. You have a statute.
You have the whole thing. There has never been an insurrection that was largely unarmed. Okay. And I know people are going to say they had fire extinguishers and sticks. If your intention is to take over the United States government, you're going to come heavy, you're going to come hard, you're going to be armed.
This was a riot. And that's bad enough. January 6th was bad enough. It was a riot. Ashley Babbitt, for good reason, bad reason no reason was where she was.
she put that officer in fear of his life with like 10 other people. And that's how she got shot.
We don't know that she put him in fear of his life because there was never an investigation into it. So Michael Byrd, the man who shot her to death, had already been sanctioned for leaving his loaded Glock in the men's room of the Capitol. Now you tell me I don't know what your view of firearms is, but I have a lot of views on firearms. you can't leave a striker fired handgun with a bullet in the chamber with no safety and you leave that in the men's room. as a cop, you should be fired immediately.
that's negligent and a mortal threat to anyone else who uses the men's room, especially children. So that guy shot her. oh, that's great. Winchester pump.
That's not my gun. That's not my, that's not. that is my son, that's Mario. Oh, I love that. And that is a.
yeah, that's a breech loaded Winchester. I know my guns. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not anti-weapon. but here's the thing.
there was no investigation.
I know, but hold on, he's. first of all. the investigation is what we all saw on video the and what he said.
Do cops get to shoot people without a warning?
Um.
I don't think they do actually.
don't get to shoot you without a warning in a situation where they are exercising a use of force in apprehending you. In a situation where there is a mob descending upon this guy, he's trying to hold the glass doors because he wants lawmakers to not get hanged or whatever, and they're breaking through. he then made a judgment that his life was going to be threatened.
But what I'm saying? it was a criminal.
and him. leaving a weapon somewhere is a bad move, but it doesn't have any relevance in terms of what he did.
Well, of course it does, because it speaks to his judgment. and here here's the point I would make is that Ashley Babbitt was not a mob, she was an individual.
part of.
but he didn't shoot a mob. he shot an unarmed woman who was under 5'5, who did not pose a mortal threat to him. and if she did tell me how, and he killed her. and so just on the basis of those facts alone. I need to know more.
but we don't know more because there was no investigation. it was just swept under the rug. and then he goes on TV and accuses everyone of racism who doesn't like the killing that he committed. and then you have people on television saying I'm so glad that she died, I'm so glad that she was killed. this is a.
this is a a veteran, by the way, who runs a pool company in San Diego. this is the. this is the person who served the country and was getting the least benefit from. she runs a freaking pool company. ok, she's not working at Black Rock and her death is like totally fine, because we don't like her politics.
if they think it's ok to kill Ashley Babbitt when she posed no mortal threat to anybody, not even conceivably, then they'll be happy when I die. that's how I feel about it.
God forbid, and you're probably not wrong, because the fact that there's even a they in your analysis of it shows that we're in the wrong place.
Morning Joe. I'm specifically of Morning Joe.
yeah, but what I'm saying? no, no, but what I'm saying that.
humanity should be an absolute value. you know. amen, when, like January 6th, I know, people will say it was an insurrection, people think ok, fine, he wasn't charged with that, and there's a reason he wasn't charged with that. it's not a technicality, um, and your approach and the approach of other people that, hey, this was just. you know, these guys were in the wrong place, the wrong way, but that's all it was.
I don't agree with that. I think it was a riot and I think they were way over the line and I think that they were motivated.
to go way over the line.
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