Fox & Friends hosts Tucker Carlson to promote his January 6 “false flag” series

Brian Kilmeade suggests that “the FBI was actually pushing for this invasion”

Video file

Citation From the November 1, 2021, edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends

BRIAN KILMEADE (CO-HOST): And that's a lot of the theme you get throughout this series. Tucker Carlson joins us now for very good reason. Tucker, this is getting a lot of – good to see you, by the way – this is getting a lot of buzz. A lot of people don't want you to do this series. Why is that?

TUCKER CARLSON (HOST, TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT): Well, it's interesting.

I mean, one of the first things we noticed about that day which, you know, anyone who watched it I think was appalled by it – totally opposed to vandalism, totally opposed to any kind of mob violence, et cetera, et cetera – but the lying began almost immediately. It wasn't just fog of war stuff where you're not quite sure what's happening. The intentional creation of a dishonest explanation for that day began within hours. This was a racist insurrection. Well, there was no evidence ever to this day of any racist motive behind any of this. There was no evidence it was an organized insurrection, an attempt to overcome the U.S. government – that was a lie. We were told, and are still told many people were killed that day. That was a lie, one person was killed, an unarmed Trump supporter, a woman who was shot to death by a Capitol Police officer with a record of recklessness. So the picture based on the facts is very different from the story that we are being told.

So, several months ago, we sent a group of reporters out to really forensically dig into this. What happened? What are the facts of that day? Let's be honest about it. We rolled out last week a trailer of what we found, a minute and 20 seconds representing three documentary episodes, and the entire news media, the Congress went completely crazy. Yesterday, The Washington Post put 75 reporters – 75 reporters – on a rebuttal piece to our documentary, which they hadn't seen. Which means that somewhere orbiting above Earth, Jeff Bezos, their boss, called in and said control the narrative! So it really tells you everything they are hysterical in the face of facts being added to this storyline. Why is it so important for them to control how we understand what happened that day?

KILMEADE: And to exaggerate.

CARLSON: And the reason is it's being used as a pretext to strip American citizens who don't vote for them of their civil liberties. This is happening on a massive scale, and I think we lay it out pretty clearly in this series.

KILMEADE: And you know, you've indicated too, if you watch your show every night, you'll talk about some of this and say hey, maybe we should pull back and stop having the – have the herd mentality when it comes to this story, maybe there's something else here. And the part one that I'm just about done with, you do talk about somebody being labeled a white nationalist that happens to be Black, and he's been stripped of all of social media, he's been stripped of any type of way to make a living, I guess he's under surveillance. So there's a lot of people along the way whose lives are destroyed, and the indication is unjustly.

CARLSON: Well, sure, and I mean, the danger in a society like ours where you have this massive national security state and these huge very powerful intelligence agencies, all of which are focused outward on our foreign enemies – the danger is that they will be turned inward on people who disagree with the party in power. That's the terrifying scenario we've worried about for hundreds of years, and unfortunately, with the help of some Republicans in Congress, not surprisingly the neocons, people like Lindsey Graham and Liz Cheney, this has happened. So you have the largest manhunt in American history is the round-up after January 6. By the way, we have been really consistent from day one: Let's enforce the law, people who break the law should be punished for what they've done, I feel that way about the protesters who broke the law on January 6. But let's not pretend they are Al Qaeda, they're not, they are American citizens, they are poorer than average actually, these are salt of the earth, working-class people and to treat them like they are Al Qaeda and to throw them into solitary confinement for six months, to shoot one without warning and act like her life meant nothing is very ominous and we should not allow that in our society. Period.

KILMEADE: Last point, as we talk about your three-point series, part one drops today, Patriot Purge, Tucker, as you point out too, the FBI will infiltrate groups whether it's the mob of Al Qaeda and they'll try to be one of them and unwind the plot before it takes place.

CARLSON: Right. 

KILMEADE: Do you think maybe, perhaps and maybe you don't want to give away your series, you find indications that the FBI was actually pushing for this invasion?

CARLSON: There were people working for the FBI in the crowd that day. We said that months ago on our nighttime show, hysteria ensued, it turns out to be true. The FBI has a long history of doing this. We know that some of the people who apparently did coordinate the breach of the Capitol have not been indicted, why is that? We can't get a straight answer. Members of Congress who try to get a straight answer can't. Look, I would just say this series is rock solid factually, it's totally not only defensible but we believe portrays the events in the correct light, which is again is to say, factually, we got to the facts and I would just urge people to watch. You can go to TuckerCarlson.com and watch the first five minutes free, judge for yourself, but the idea that The Washington Post spent 75 reporters time rebutting a trailer tells you they don't want you to know what actually happened. They're hysterical and ask yourself, why are they hysterical?

KILMEADE: And why is it that every other network if you took January 6 out of their rundown, they would have a test pattern. This is all – this is all they cover.

CARLSON: Exactly.

KILMEADE: It's unbelievable.

CARLSON: Exactly.

KILMEADE: Hey, Tucker, I really appreciate you getting up. I know you're excited about this series,

CARLSON: We are.

KILMEADE: I'm through part one, and with all the contacts I have at Fox, I could not get all three parts into my inbox.

CARLSON: I couldn't either. 

KILMEADE: That's how top secret this is.

Revolver's Darren Beattie, who is featured in the Tucker Carlson Originals clip that Fox & Friends played, was a speechwriter fired by Donald Trump's White House following a report that he had attended a white nationalist conference. The Washington Post has more on his appearance in Tucker Carlson's special.

In the clip, Carlson absurdly claims multiple times that The Washington Post's massive feature from October 31 about the Capitol attack was all done to rebut his documentary.

Host Brian Kilmeade also amplifies Carlson's prior conspiracy theory that the FBI was behind the January 6 attack. This is clear indication that Carlson's 1/6 Truther movement is spreading at Fox News.

Furthermore, Fox & Friends hosting Carlson to promote the special comes as Fox News tries to distance itself from Fox Nation, where the special is airing (including YouTube). As The Daily Dot reported:

Carlson is Fox News’ most popular host, the anchor of its primetime show, the most-watched show on cable news. But this documentary about Jan. 6 is not a Fox News joint.

In our story, the Daily Dot did not mention that the show had Fox News’ backing, just that it was being released by Carlson. We did mention that one prominent conservative called out Fox News’ personalities over it, asking them to denounce it.

But after we ran it, Fox News emailed the Daily Dot with an “Update Request.”

It said at the top of the email “not for publication,” but as PR teams know, you need to agree on the conditions of publication of information before it is provided. The Daily Dot did not agree to Fox’s demand when it was sent this quote, and thus is not bound by the request.

Plus, you should know that even Fox News wants to distance itself from Carlson’s documentary, which claims patriots are being “purged” by the federal government.

“Can you please add so it’s clear that these new episodes are for FOX Nation? The subscription based streaming platform that is behind a paywall. I don’t see that noted anywhere in the piece. Tucker Carlson Originals is not for the channel.”

So there you have it. You must pay and subscribe to Fox Nation to watch the documentary, because Fox News will not be airing it. We want to be clear about that.

(A network representative also reached out to The New York Daily News to distinguish between Fox Nation and Fox News.)

Fox News is not airing the special – it is just uncritically promoting it.

If anything, this speaks to the responsibility that Fox Corp. executives have for the lies and misinformation on Fox Nation.

Check back later today for more on the special itself.

Update (11/1/21, 12:15 p.m EDT): This post has been updated with additional information.