Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson issued his first public comments since it was announced that he would be departing the network earlier this week, appearing outside his home in Florida with his wife.
“Retirement is going great so far,” he joked to the Daily Mail, which published photos of him and his wife outside of his Boca Grande house while driving a golf cart. “I haven’t eaten dinner with my wife on a weeknight in seven years.”
When asked about his future plans, Carlson again joked: “Appetizers plus entree.” According to the Mail reporter, he drove away in the golf cart with his wife without elaborating on what he is going to do next.
Neither Fox News nor Carlson have provided any details about why he suddenly left the network after hosting one of the top-rated cable news programs for years. A news release issued by the company said the two parted ways and said it would use a rotating slate of hosts for a temporary show during the 8 p.m. timeslot until a new host is named.
There has been speculation that a lawsuit filed by a former producer, Abby Grossberg, may have been one of the reasons for his departure. She claimed Carlson fostered a toxic work environment in which producers allegedly would make vulgar remarks, although Carlson hasn’t responded publicly to the allegations, and a Fox News spokesperson told news outlets that the company “will continue to vigorously defend Fox against Ms. Grossberg’s unmeritorious legal claims, which are riddled with false allegations against Fox and our employees.”
Other than Grossberg’s claim, a number of anonymously sourced articles have asserted that Carlson may have been let go for a number of reasons. On Tuesday evening, a Vanity Fair report—which The Epoch Times cannot authenticate as true—alleged that Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch removed Carlson after remarks he gave at the Heritage Foundation over the past weekend.
“I have concluded it might be worth taking just 10 minutes out of your busy schedule to say a prayer for the future, and I hope you will,” Carlson said in the keynote speech. The former Fox News host also made note of what he described as widespread moral decay across society and issued warnings about the future of Western civilization.
By Jack Phillips
