The Kremlin propaganda machine has made Tucker Carlson its newest star television host, whether he likes it or not.
The former Fox News host has gotten his own show on the state-run channel Rossiya 24—except it’s not quite as new as the channel would have people believe. The program, called “Tucker. Rossiya 24,” treats viewers to days-old episodes of Carlson’s own show posted on X and YouTube, but with a Russian voiceover.
An episode was aired Monday night, for example, featuring Carlson discussing conspiracy theories about Lyme disease being used as a bioweapon under the title “ticks–nuclear weapons for the poor.” The same episode, minus the Russian voiceover, was available to American social media users on May 10.
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The website of the All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company features several other episodes of the supposedly new show, all of them featuring praise for Moscow, criticism of Ukraine, or grim predictions concerning the fate of the U.S.
In a description of the program, the site notes that Carlson “has actively criticized U.S. authorities for helping Ukraine since the start of the [war],” and that he was added to a well-known database of “enemies of Ukraine” last summer.
Carlson did not respond to a request for comment from The Daily Beast but he told CNN that he knew nothing about the Russian programming move.
“It’s all fake obviously, like most stories in American news media. Of course I have no partnership with Russia. The first I'd heard anything about this was (this) morning,” he said.
The CEO of Tucker Carlson Network, Neil Patel, said no deals had been done with Russia.
“The Tucker Carlson Network has not done any deals with state media in any country. Whoever is currently pretending to be the old Newsweek brand would know that if they had checked with us before printing like news companies are supposed to do,” he said.
