Television host Tucker Carlson and Fox News have “agreed to part ways,” Fox said in a statement Monday.
“We thank him for his service to the network,” Fox said in the statement about the top-rated host, which noted that Carlson’s last show was on Friday.
The news comes nearly one week after a $787.5 million settlement agreement between the network and Dominion Voting Systems, which had accused Fox of knowingly pushing false conspiracy theories.
Carlson privately texted his producer that the allegations about Dominion were “absurd,” according to the Dominion filing. Also that day, Carlson’s producer texted him about his own doubts.
“I don’t think there is evidence of voter fraud that swung the election,” producer Alex Pfeiffer texted to Carlson, per the lawsuit. “The software s–t is absurd,” Carlson allegedly responded.
Carlson also texted one of his producers that, “there wasn’t enough fraud to change the outcome” of the election. According to the filings, and later said that Sidney Powell, one of then-President Donald Trump’s attorneys and a vocal promulgator of election denialism, “is lying.”
On the day of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capital, Carlson called Trump “a demonic force, a destroyer” in a text message to the same producer.
In an exchange with members of his staff in early January 2021, Carlson wrote, “We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait,” and “I hate him passionately.”
Carlson’s final broadcast of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” aired last Friday. The show “Fox News Tonight” is set to air as an interim show led by rotating hosts until his successor in the 8 p.m. time slot is named, Fox said.
Carlson joined Fox News as a contributor in 2009 and served as a co-host of “Fox and Friends Weekend” from 2012 to 2016. His eponymous nightly show debuted in November 2016. He moved into the 8 p.m. slot in April 2017.
Credit: ABC News, CBS News