The Anti-Defamation League on Thursday night denounced Fox News host Tucker Carlson over his claim that MSNBC host Tiffany Cross was inciting a “race war” against white people in the United States.
“Tucker Carlson has again used his platform to stoke racial tensions, falsely and dangerously accusing a Black MSNBC host of instigating a genocide against white people,” the organization’s official Twitter account posted. “His incitement and his trivialization of the Rwandan genocide must be forcefully condemned.”
During his Wednesday night Fox News broadcast, Carlson compared Cross’ weekend program to the propaganda media network that spewed ethnic hate speech throughout the Rwandan civil war. He then alleged that the MSNBC host was pushing minorities not only to despise white Americans but to engage in violence against them.
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“So it’s not just whites, it’s white women. ‘Their women are bad too!’ The women, of course, are the key to reproducing the white race, which is clearly a threat, as she says again and again to you and your family,” Carlson exclaimed on Wednesday. “They’re dangerous. They want to hurt you.”
Later on in the segment, he also suggested that MSNBC management and its parent company, Comcast, were actively and intentionally supporting this supposed incitement by its Black host.
“Ask yourself, why are they putting this on the air?” Carlson asked. “Why are they allowing this? This is not a policy debate. These are open attacks on people, on Americans, on the basis purely of their race.”
He added: “Do they know what’s happening on their channel? Are they OK with this? What do you think happens if we continue to talk this way? You may not watch this channel, but some people do. What does this look like in a year? Or five years? 10 years? We’re a country at war with itself, a race war.”
This is hardly the first time that the ADL has condemned Carlson over his rhetoric, which it has labeled as bigoted and perpetuating white supremacy. Last year, for instance, the group repeatedly called for Carlson to be fired for endorsing the racist “Great Replacement” theory—only for Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch to wave off their demands.
Carlson, meanwhile, has laughed off their complaints about his increasingly strident far-right nationalism.
“Oh, fuck them,” Carlson declared to former Fox News colleague Megyn Kelly last fall. “The ADL was such a noble organization that had a very specific goal, which was to fight antisemitism. That’s a virtuous goal. I think they were pretty successful over the years. Now it’s operated by a guy who’s… just an apparatchik of the Democratic Party.”
The primetime cable news star added: “The source of our strength is non-white DNA? I mean, how could you say something like that? Really? So people’s value to the country is determined by their genes and their skin color? That’s like Nazi stuff.”
Fox News did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the ADL’s latest condemnation of Carlson.
