Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) called Tucker Carlson’s segment on Jan. 6 “a mistake for Fox News,” a sharp contrast from House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), who supplied Carlson with the exclusive footage from the day of the attack that aired on Monday night.
The comments follow Thomas Manger, chief of the U.S. Capitol Police, denouncing the Fox News host's portrayal of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol as “filled with offensive and misleading conclusions” and accusing him of cherry-picking footage to give a misleading account of the riots.
"I want to associate myself entirely with the opinion of the chief and the Capitol Police about what happened on Jan. 6," McConnell said as he held up a copy of the Tuesday letter that Manger sent to his Capitol Police colleagues. "It was a mistake, in my view, for Fox News to depict this in a way that’s completely at variance with what our chief law enforcement official here at the Capitol thinks.”
CAPITOL POLICE CHIEF BLASTS TUCKER CARLSON FOR SAYING OFFICERS ACTED AS 'TOUR GUIDES' ON JAN. 6
Carlson released the first portion of never-before-seen surveillance video from the riot at the Capitol by Trump supporters on his show Monday, calling it “mostly peaceful chaos.”
McConnell declined to say directly if he believes it was a mistake for McCarthy to share the Jan. 6 security footage with Carlson, sidestepping any criticism of the GOP leader. “My concern is how it was depicted," he said.
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“Clearly, the chief of the Capitol Police, in my view, correctly described what most of us witnessed first-hand on Jan. 6,” McConnell said.
A handful of other Senate Republicans on Tuesday pushed back on Carlson's segment, with Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) calling the Jan. 6 portrayal "bulls***."
In late February, Carlson announced that McCarthy had given him exclusive access to 44,000 hours of security video from the riot. The Fox News host is planning to release more of the footage on Tuesday night.