On the eve of a multi-billion dollar defamation lawsuit, a text message sent from Tucker Carlson, who sparked panic at Fox’s highest levels, said its most popular host was criticizing his personal and incitement to violence and race. It showed that they shared a similar point of view.
Discovery of the message contributed to a chain of events that ultimately led to Mr. Carlson’s dismissal.
In a message sent to one of his producers hours after violent Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, Carlson said he recently watched a video of a group of men. He explained how he — a Trump supporter, he said — would lash out at the “children of Antifa.”
It was “at least three to one,” he wrote.
And he was disappointed that his attacker was white like himself.
“It’s plain disrespectful to jump a man like that,” he wrote.
“That’s not how white men fight,” he said. However, he wanted the group to kill someone he described as an Antifa child.
For years, Mr. Carlson has championed views on his show that amplify the ideology of white nationalism. But the text messages revealed more about his views on racial superiority.
The Fox board saw this message the day before Fox was set to defend itself against the Dominion voting system before a jury and warned against this text. The board became concerned that the message would become public at the trial in which Mr. Carlson was on the stand, creating a sensational and damaging moment that would raise broader questions about the company. .
The day after the revelations, the board told Fox executives that it would hire an outside law firm to investigate Mr. Carlson’s actions.
The text message spurred an increase in internal problems with Mr. Carlson, who led company management to conclude that Mr. Carlson was more of a problem than an asset and had to step down, according to people familiar with the decision. attached. Other messages made vulgar and misogynistic references to women, including senior Fox executives. The message about the fight also played a role in the company’s decision to settle with Dominion for $787.5 million, the highest known defamation case.
A representative for Carlson said there was no comment.
This text is part of a redacted court filing, the contents of which were not previously reported. The contents of the letter were revealed in interviews with multiple people close to the defamation lawsuit against Fox. I spoke on condition of anonymity because I didn’t want to be identified because we were discussing a message protected by a court order. In published applications, it is hidden behind a block of black text.
Carlson’s messages were collected as part of a defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion against Fox, accusing the network of knowingly broadcasting lies about election fraud. have been made public, including those shared among Fox executives and hosts. , the others remain edited.
In that text, Carlson described his feelings when he saw a video of violent clashes on the streets of Washington. Carlson did not specify the race of the man who was attacked.
“I noticed that the mob was rooting for the mob against the man. I hoped they would beat him harder and kill him. I really wanted it. I could taste it,” he wrote. “That’s when an alarm went off somewhere in my brain. This is not good for me. I’m becoming something I don’t want to be.”
Ultimately, he wrote, “Someone probably loved this kid and would be crushed if he was killed.”
“If I don’t care about those things, if I reduce people to their politics, am I better than him?” he wrote.
The text message caught the attention of Fox’s board of directors and senior executives on the Sunday before the trial began last month, according to two people familiar with Fox’s internal deliberations. At the time, Fox negotiators were discussing an out-of-court settlement before vowing to serve on various jurors.
The next day, the board told Fox management about its plans to ask law firms Wachtel, Lipton, Rosen and Katz to investigate Mr. Carlson. That disclosure opened up the possibility of an ongoing investigation into what was behind Mr. Carlson’s message at the same time as the trial. He was the top host during prime time.
Fox has not commented on Mr. Carlson’s dismissal last week, other than an initial statement announcing that they “agreed to separate” and “thanked him for his service.” He did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday about the content of Mr. Carlson’s edited message.
Given that Fox’s legal team was aware of it and other offensive texts written by Mr. Carlson, it remains unclear how the texts received less attention earlier. created and was involved in editing the text as part of the discovery process. Carlson was even asked about it during the deposition, according to several people who read the pre-edited deposition.
It was not guaranteed that the text would be revealed in open court. According to multiple people with knowledge of Dominion’s attorneys’ plans, Dominion’s attorneys would either present the sentences before a jury or I hadn’t decided yet. The parties disagreed as to whether Dominion’s attorneys could have presented such a redacted message at trial had they decided to do so, and it would have been ultimately up to the judge. Decision. After Fox signed an 11-hour contract to pay Dominion $787.5 million on April 18 to avoid a trial, the difference became incontrovertible.
How Fox’s management and board handled the case months before it was due to go to trial is expected to be at issue in a shareholder lawsuit filed against the company in Delaware.
Mr. Carlson’s show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” was only a small part of the Dominion lawsuit, but his personal texts were highly scrutinized.
The text about the fight came on top of a chain of damaging messages that were publicly revealed ahead of the trial and were themselves shocking. in a letter to , describing the president he defended on the show as a “devil force” and a “destroyer.”
A recurring theme of his show for six years, which aired primetime on Fox News, was the migration of white Americans by people of color. framed as part of a larger struggle between Immigrants and other marginalized groups are steadily and steadily depriving whites of what has long been theirs: political and cultural power in the United States. .
He attacked black social justice activists and portrayed immigration from Central America as a national ruin.
In the aftermath of the El Paso massacre at the hands of a gunman who cited white supremacist beliefs in his manifesto, Mr. Carlson declared on his show that white supremacy “is not a real problem,” saying that it was likened to a conspiracy theory.
On Monday, The New York Times and other news outlets urged the judge overseeing the Dominion case to publish some of the redacted messages.
