Tucker Puts GOP Also-Rans Through Political Meat Grinder – Former FOX News host Tucker Carlson put second-tier GOP presidential candidates through a rhetorical meatgrinder as he interrogated them about Ukraine and other issues at the Family Leadership Summit in Iowa. Family Leader, a politically active group of evangelical church leaders, sponsored the event.
He now hosts his own independent show on Twitter. Blaze TV live-streamed the event.
Tucker Carlson asked tough, pointed questions to former Vice President Mike Pence, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.
Carlson has publicly stated he likes former President Donald Trump and how he has transformed the American political landscape by bringing things that people used to not be able to discuss into the open.
Trump did not participate.
Tucker Carlson Calls Out Pence on Ukraine
Tucker Carlson saved most of his fire for former Vice President Mike Pence.
“If you look at every city in America. Things have become much worse over the past three years. Drive around. There’s not one city that’s gotten better in the United States, and it’s visible. Our economy has degraded; the suicide rate has jumped, public filth and disorder, and crime have exponentially increased; and yet your concern is that the Ukrainians, a country that most people cannot find on a map who have received 100s of billions of U.S. tax dollars don’t have enough tanks, I think it’s a fair question to ask where’s the concern for the United States,” Carlson said.
Pence smacked down Carlson saying, “That’s not my concern. I’ve heard that routine from you before, but that’s not my concern.” He replied that America can do both. It can restore its greatness at home and abroad.
“Anybody who says we can’t be the leader of the free world, and solve our problems at home has a pretty small view of the greatest nation on Earth,” Pence said. “We can do both.”
Tucker Carlson Hits Asa Hutchinson Over Transgender Treatments
Carlson went after Hutchinson for his veto of an Arkansas bill banning transgender treatments for minors in 2021, which Hutchinson claimed put a “very vulnerable population in a more difficult position.”
“You believe I suppose that people can change their sex, because if you didn’t believe that you wouldn’t call it treatment now would you?” Carlson asked.
Hutchinson hemmed and hawed giving a politician’s answer, “Hormonal treatment is a different issue and can be a different issue, and when you look at the bill I vetoed there was not any grandfather clause in there … I think of the parents, I think of the constitution … and if you look at the decision of the judge who struck it down, they sided with the parents as well.
“I didn’t say what I supported. I said what I vetoed … I want the government to stay out. I want the parents, the communities, and our faith to guide us through these difficult decisions.”
Carlson Asks Nikki Haley Who Blew Up the Nordstream Pipeline
Carlson asked Haley who blew up the NordStream Pipeline amid laughter. Haley had a dumbfounded look on her face.
“I don’t know … Do you know who did it?” Haley responded.
Carlson riposted, “It seems pretty straightforward that it was backed by the Biden administration,” continuing that it was strange that no one wanted to explain what really happened.
“I think there are a lot of things that were strange with the Biden administration,” Haley said.
DeSantis Says He Would Bring the Bureaucracy to Heel
DeSantis was the last person to face Tucker Carlson. He clarified that he considers Vladimir Putin a war criminal but worries about mission creep.
He said that he would bring the federal bureaucracy to heel if he were elected by having a team of thousands of appointees ready to go on the first day of his administration. That way the career bureaucrats would not run roughshod over him like they did to Trump.
“They are all going to rake you over the coals. You are either down for that or not going to be able to handle that, and you don’t have the backbone to do that you will fail at that job,” DeSantis said. “I look at Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court as the example because he doesn’t budge, because he doesn’t care what the media says about him. They’ve smeared him six ways from Sunday. He does what he thinks is right.”
Ramaswamy promised during his segment that he would work to bring the FBI and IRS under control and would end aid to Ukraine.
Trump’s absence at the forum and his sizable lead in the polls, and the fact Carlson’s questions surrounded many issues that Trump made his hallmark suggests that he has a commanding presence even in his absence.
John Rossomando is a defense and counterterrorism analyst and served as Senior Analyst for Counterterrorism at The Investigative Project on Terrorism for eight years. His work has been featured in numerous publications such as The American Thinker, The National Interest, National Review Online, Daily Wire, Red Alert Politics, CNSNews.com, The Daily Caller, Human Events, Newsmax, The American Spectator, TownHall.com, and Crisis Magazine. He also served as senior managing editor of The Bulletin, a 100,000-circulation daily newspaper in Philadelphia, and received the Pennsylvania Associated Press Managing Editors first-place award for his reporting.
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