Tucker Carlson: Roy Moore Shouldn’t ‘Use His Faith as a Shield’ Against Accusations – That’s the Al Sharpton Script

On Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Fox host Tucker Carlson argued that Alabama Republican Senate nominee Roy Moore is following the Al Sharpton playbook and using his faith “as a shield” by responding to the allegations against him by claiming they are due to bias against Christian conservatives.

Carlson said that it’s “impossible” to know for certain whether Moore or his accusers are telling the truth, but we do know for sure that “Roy Moore should respond to specific allegations with specific explanations. It’s not enough to say people don’t like him for what he believes. In a recent tweet, Moore declared that ‘The forces of evil will lie, cheat, steal –– even inflict physical harm –– if they believe it will silence and shut up Christian conservatives [like you and me].’ In an interview, Moore said the allegations against him are a smear by people who ‘don’t want to hear the truths about God and about the Constitution.’ Now there is some truth in that. Of course, there are people who hate Roy Moore because of his beliefs, his Christian beliefs, the entire American left, for example.”

Carlson continued, “But that’s not exactly the point here. The point is that Moore has been accused of appalling behavior on the record by a number of women, not all of them liberals, at least one of them a Trump voter. Moore’s response? He’s claiming to be the victim of bigotry. Now that’s what demagogues do when they are cornered. That’s what Al Sharpton does.”

He added, “Not everyone accused of something is guilty of it, obviously, and we ought to keep that in mind, not just in Moore’s case, but in all of these cases. Roy Moore has every right to protest his innocence, and maybe he is innocent. What he’s not allowed to do is drag God into all of this. God is not accused of trolling for teenagers in shopping malls. This is not about Christianity. It’s about Roy Moore. And it discredits Christianity when Christians allow Moore to use his faith as a shield. It’s offensive to real believers.”

Carlson also stated, “I almost hate to weigh in on this. Because it’s one of those stories where, everybody I disagree with who hates Roy Moore for all the wrong reasons, which is to say because of his beliefs, is weighing in on one side of it. But I don’t think that conservatives ought to follow the script that Al Sharpton wrote and practices, infuriatingly, which is, caught not paying his taxes, claims bias. And it looks to me like Roy Moore is doing the same thing with Christianity, a faith I happen to believe in. And so there’s something really wrong about that, I think.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett