Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson expressed regret over supporting President Donald Trump, saying in a video released Monday that he would “be tormented by it for a long time” and apologized for “misleading” people.
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“I do think it’s like a moment to wrestle with our own consciences,” Carlson said on “The Tucker Carlson Show,” referring to the role of his and others’ support for Trump. “You know, we’ll be tormented by it for a long time. I will be, and I want to say I’m sorry for misleading people. It was not intentional.”
Carlson, once a staunch supporter of the president, pointed in the video to having campaigned for Trump, saying, “We’re implicated in this for sure.”
“It’s not enough to say, ‘Well, I changed my mind,'” Carlson said during the show, during which he interviewed his brother, Buckley Carson. “Or like, ‘Oh, this is bad. I’m out.’ It’s like, in very small ways, but in real ways, you and me and millions of people like us for the reason this is happening right now.”
Carlson’s remarks come amid a growing public splinter on the right over Trump’s handling of the war in Iran. Trump is facing the lowest job approval rating of his second term as a growing number of Americans strongly disapprove of the president’s handling of inflation and the cost of living, which is consistently a top issue for voters.
Reached for comment, the White House pointed to an April 9 Truth Social post from Trump, who said that Carlson and other Trump allies-turned-critics “have one thing in common, Low IQs.”
“They’re stupid people, they know it, their families know it, and everyone else knows it, too!” Trump said in the lengthy post.
After Carlson criticized Trump’s handling of Iran earlier this month, Trump told the New York Post that he believed Carlson was “a low-IQ person” who has “absolutely no idea what’s going on.”
Carlson isn’t the only high-profile former Trump supporter to break with the president in recent months. Right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene have called for the 25th Amendment to be invoked to oust Trump from office. Carrie Prejean Boller, who served as a Trump-appointed member of the Religious Liberty Commission until February, called Trump an “evil psychopath” in an Instagram post and far-right influencer Candace Owens called the Trump administration “satanic.”
Influential podcasters in the so-called “manosphere” have also criticized Trump’s handling of Iran. Joe Rogan said in March that some Trump supporters felt “betrayed” by the war, and Theo Von questioned whether the war was helping regular Americans. But even before the war, prominent podcasters have criticized Trump on issues such as immigration, the Epstein files and U.S.-Israeli relations.
Carlson was a strong supporter of the president, but he has become increasingly critical of Trump during his second term, particularly over his handling of Iran. He previously urged the president’s military aides to reject any plan to kill Iranian civilians, and he slammed Trump’s post earlier this month that called on Iran to “open the F—– Strait, you crazy bastards.” Carlson said that “on every level,” the post was “vile.”
Carlson’s son, whose name is also Buckley Carlson, worked in Vice President JD Vance’s press office but departed recently to start his own firm.
Carlson left Fox News in 2023 shortly after Fox agreed to pay a $787.5 million settlement to Dominion Voting Systems over defamation allegations.