NEW YORK — Fox News on Monday ousted prime-time host Tucker Carlson, whose stew of grievances and political theories about Russia and the Jan. 6 insurrection had grown to define the network in recent years and make him an influential force in GOP politics.
Fox said that the network and Carlson had “agreed to part ways,” but offered no explanation for the stunning move, saying that the last broadcast of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” aired last Friday. Carlson ended the show by saying, “We’ll be back on Monday.”
Yet on Monday night, viewers tuned in to morning anchor Brian Kilmeade, who said that Carlson was gone, “as you may have heard.”
“I wish Tucker the best,” Kilmeade said. “I’m great friends with Tucker and always will be.”
Then, he switched to a story on Hunter Biden, the president’s son.
The break from Carlson comes amid a cascade of bad legal news for the network. A week ago, Fox agreed to pay more than $787 million to settle a lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems over the network’s airing of false claims following the 2020 presidential election — shortly before Carlson was expected to be called to testify.
CBS’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday aired a report about a man caught up in a Jan. 6 conspiracy theory who said Carlson was “obsessed” with him, and whose lawyer has put Fox on notice of potential litigation. Carlson was also recently named in a lawsuit by a former Fox producer who said the show had a cruel and misogynistic workplace, and that she had been pressured to give misleading testimony in the Dominion case.
Meanwhile, CNN axed its own embattled anchor, Don Lemon, part of a one-day bloodletting in cable television news on Monday. Lemon had been a bad fit with his fellow morning hosts and was forced to apologize to GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley for his comment that she was past her prime.
Carlson, however, had a greater influence, higher viewer count and more shocking exit. He worked at both CNN and MSNBC earlier in his career, then ditched his bow-tie look and quickly became Fox’s most popular personality after replacing Bill O’Reilly in the network’s prime-time lineup in 2017.
His populist tone about elites who are out to get average Americans rang true with Fox’s predominantly conservative audience, even leading to talk about Carlson becoming a political candidate himself one day.
He did not immediately return a message seeking comment on Monday.
Shares of Fox Corp. slid 4% within seconds of the announcement of Carlson’s departure, then recovered to be down 2.9% at the end of trading.
“Tucker Carlson had become even bigger than Fox News,” said Brian Stelter, who is writing an upcoming book about Fox, “Network of Lies.” “His sudden ouster will have profound consequences for Fox News, for TV news and the Republican Party.”
When Carlson’s exit was announced during a live showing of the ABC daytime talk show “The View” on Monday, the studio audience applauded. Host Ana Navarro then led the crowd in a singalong to a line from the song, “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye.”
Earlier this year, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy gave Carlson exclusive access to security tapes from the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, which the show used to conclude: “The footage does not show an insurrection or riot in progress.” His interpretation was denounced by many, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
The “60 Minutes” report Sunday was about Raymond Epps, a former Marine and Trump supporter from Arizona who was in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. He was later falsely accused of being a government agent conducting a “false flag” operation to start trouble that would be blamed on Trump supporters. Epps and his wife had to sell their business and home because of threats tied to these conspiracy theories.
On CBS, Epps said Carlson was “obsessed” with him and “going to any means possible to destroy my life.”
Carlson was expected to be called as a witness if Dominion’s case had gone to trial.