The former Fox News anchor said he is interviewing the Russian president because “we’re in journalism, our duty is to inform people.”
Tucker Carlson has been criticized online for justifying his planned interview with Vladimir Putin as being in the interests of media freedom while the Russian president’s government has aggressively enforced a ban on protests, clamped down on the press and jailed journalists.
“The host’s anti-Ukraine talking points have even been celebrated by and circulated in Russian state media,” Media Matters said.
After speculation following the former Fox News anchor’s appearances in the Russian capital, Carlson posted a video on X in which he confirmed he would speak with the Russian leader and gave as one of his reasons: “We’re in journalism, our duty is to inform people.”
Carlson said that two years into the war in Ukraine started by Putin, “most Americans are not informed,” but that “they should know because they are paying for in ways they might not yet fully perceive.
