Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) slammed Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson’s portrayal of the Jan. 6 riot as a lie and said Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is “every bit as culpable" after the House speaker made 44,000 hours of footage from the attack available to Carlson.
Carlson released the first portion of never-before-seen surveillance video from the riot at the Capitol by supporters of former President Donald Trump on his show Monday, calling it “mostly peaceful chaos.”
McCarthy decided to grant Carlson access to all of the Capitol’s security footage from Jan. 6, sparking outrage after Carlson was linked to a documentary series that called the attack a “false flag” operation that would turn people against Trump and his supporters.
MCCARTHY HIT WITH ETHICS COMPLAINT AFTER HANDING OVER JAN. 6 TAPES TO TUCKER CARLSON
Schumer called Carlson’s airing of the Jan. 6 tapes “one of the most shameful hours of television,” saying Carlson had cherry-picked security footage to manipulate how the attack appeared. He also criticized McCarthy for giving Carlson and Fox News exclusive access.
“Speaker McCarthy is every bit as culpable as Mr. Carlson. Mr. McCarthy’s decision to share security footage with Fox looked like a mistake from the very beginning. But after last night, it looks like a disaster,” Schumer said on the Senate floor on Tuesday. “Speaker McCarthy has played a treacherous, treacherous game by catering to the hard Right.”
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The New York senator then made a plea to Fox News executives, including Rupert Murdoch, calling them to stop Carlson from running a second segment using the security footage.
“I urge Fox News to order Carlson to cease propagating the big lie on his network and to level with their viewers about the truth, the truth behind the efforts to mislead the public,” Schumer said. “Conduct like theirs is just asking for another Jan. 6 to happen.”
Carlson's segment comes as Murdoch recently acknowledged some Fox News commentators endorsed false allegations by Trump and his allies that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and that he didn't do anything about it, according to excerpts of a deposition recently unsealed in a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems.