WASHINGTON ― House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) defended giving Tucker Carlson surveillance footage of the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, after the conservative foxnews the anchor sparked a bipartisan backlash this week for covering up violent riots as a mostly peaceful sightseeing visit.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, McCarthy said he had no regrets exclusively sharing thousands of hours of security footage with Carlson, a prominent skeptic from Jan. 6. However, he claimed that he did not watch Carlson’s Monday night show when asked if he had any concerns.
“Exactly what I want to do is give transparency to everyone, and everyone can come to their own conclusion” about what happened on January 6, McCarthy told reporters outside the president’s office, which was ransacked by hundreds of donald trump supporters during the riot.
McCarthy’s weak response to Carlson’s lies about the Jan. 6 attack on Congress stood in stark contrast to that of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who issued a rare rebuke from Fox News earlier on Tuesday. The top Senate Republican said the GOP’s favorite cable network made “a mistake” by showing selectively edited footage of the riots, associating itself with comments by Capitol Hill Police Chief Tom Manger, who called Carlson’s show “misleading and offensive”.
When asked about McConnell and Manger’s comments, McCarthy evaded attacking CNN, claiming that the cable network revealed the safe location of members of Congress on the day of the insurrection.
“I hope McConnell would have cared about CNN,” McCarthy said.
“I don’t know what Tucker Carlson said,” he added in response to questions about the Fox News host who played down the riots.
Federal prosecutors have charged nearly 1,000 people with crimes for their actions that day, according to the Department of Justice, including more than 300 for assaulting or interfering with police. Additionally, more than 500 rioters have pleaded guilty, 60 of them to attacking officers.
More than 140 police officers were injured after a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to prevent the certification of the 2020 presidential election. The rioters scattered blood and feces around the building, urinated on the floors and destroyed furniture. .
Other Republican senators criticized Carlson and Fox News for trying to downplay the insurrection. Sen. Thom Tillis (RN.C.) called it “nonsense”; Sen. Kevin Cramer (RN.D.) said the riot at the Capitol “was clearly more than a peaceful protest by some rowdy boy scouts”; and Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) called the attack “an abomination.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (DN.Y.), who also criticized Carlson and Fox News, Announced on Tuesday that he had been invited to appear on Carlson’s show but would only do so when he “admits to his viewers live on air that he has been lying to them about the 2020 election and about what happened on January 6.”
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