Tucker Carlson in Palm Beach, Florida on July 15, 2023 (Gage Skidmore)
Right-wing media darling Tucker Carlson recently spoke with the New York Times in a far-reaching interview that touched, in part, on his sharp criticisms of President Donald Trump — including his suggestion that the president might, in fact, be the Antichrist.
Speaking with reporter Lulu Garcia-Navarro, Carlson argued he has “not” mused on his show about whether Trump is the Antichrist, a claim the New York Times reporter immediately fact-checked.
Garcia-Navarro was asking Carlson about a monologue he delivered in response to Trump’s profane Easter post on Truth Social. In that post, the president threatened Iran, demanded the opening of the Strait of Hormuz and capped his message with “Praise be to Allah.”
Carlson called the post “vile on every level.”
“How dare you speak that way on Easter morning to the country,” Carlson said in response. “Who do you think you are? You’re tweeting out the f-word on Easter morning.”
“In that monologue responding to Trump’s Easter post, you said that Trump’s comments were ‘evil,’” Garcia-Navarro said to Carlson. “And I just want to understand that a little bit better. Do you think only his comments are evil, or does the evil extend to Trump himself? Is he evil?”
Carlson replied that “there’s a lot of evil in me and in every person,” but called Trump’s mocking of other people’s gods “worse than the war with Iran.”
“I ask because you’ve been talking on your show about whether Trump is the Antichrist,” Garcia-Navarro explained.
“I have not said that,” Carlson replied.
Garcia-Navarro then directly quoted Carlson’s own words from his show, noting Carlson said “Maybe [Trump] didn’t put his hand on the Bible because he affirmatively rejects what’s inside that book.”
“And then on a recent show, you went further, saying: ‘Here’s a leader who’s mocking the gods of his ancestors, mocking the God of gods and exalting himself above them. Could this be the Antichrist?’” Garcia-Navarro quoted Carlson saying.
Carlson claimed he did not say “Could this be the Antichrist?”
He did, the reporter noted.
“I don’t know where that comes from, but I know that those words never left my lips because I’m not sure I fully understand what the Antichrist is, if there’s just one,” Carlson continued. “I actually tried to understand it. I may have said some are asking that. I am not weighing in on that because I don’t understand it, just to be totally clear.”
After some back and forth, Carlson continued: “If I thought Trump was the Antichrist, I would just say so. If I understood what the Antichrist is, I’d say so, and I don’t really.”
“I just want to make the point that you did say, ‘Could this be the Antichrist?’ And then you said, ‘Well, who knows?’ You did use those words,” the reporter later said.
“Man, then my apologies to you, if there’s a video of me saying that,” Carlson replied. “I guess what I’m expressing to you is it doesn’t reflect exactly how I feel. It suggests a precision that I haven’t arrived at, that Trump is the Antichrist. You’d have to define Antichrist, and I know that I can’t define it, and it’s not clearly defined in the New Testament or Old Testament.”
Carlson went on to tell Garcia-Navarro that Trump is a “false prophet.”