Russia Says Tucker Carlson Interview of Vladimir Putin Has Taken Place

The interview with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin announced by Tucker Carlson has been confirmed to have taken place by the Kremlin.

Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the Russian President had spoken in person to American journalist Tucker Carlson. Per Russian state media, Peskov said “Yes, I can confirm this” and “as soon as it… is ready, it will be released”.

Explaining why Russia had agreed to give Carlson an interview when it had turned down other Western journalists, Peskov said while he didn’t consider Carlson pro-Russian, he wasn’t pro-Ukrainian either, merely pro-American, and consequently “He has a position that differs from the rest [of Western media]… at least it is contrastingly different from the position of traditional Anglo-Saxon media”.

Anglo-Saxon is a common Russian dog whistle referring to what they perceive as a negative impact on global politics by white northern Europeans as represented by Washington D.C., London, and Brussels.

Why I'm interviewing Vladimir Putin. pic.twitter.com/hqvXUZqvHX

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) February 6, 2024

It was revealed that Tucker Carlson had arrived in Moscow over the weekend, and he confirmed his own presence, and his intention to interview the Russian President, in a social media statement on Tuesday evening. Carlson said interviewing Putin was important — although dangerous — because, in his view, one-sided reporting from the establishment media has left many Americans ignorant of much of what was happening with Russia.

The journalist called some reporting of the Ukraine war, which he said blindly parroted Ukraine government information, “government propaganda”.

“We are not here because we love Vladimir Putin”, Carlson said last night, remarking: “We are here because we love the United States. And we want it to remain prosperous and free.”

Tucker Carlson claimed in his clip on Wednesday that other news outlets hadn’t “bothered” to try interviewing Putin at all, a remark that was challenged by some journalists who claimed to have tried but failed in that endeavour. The Kremlin said they did receive interview requests from Western broadcasters but turned them down on the grounds they do not attempt to “at least look impartial in terms of covering what is happening”.

“All of these are media that take a one-sided position… there is no desire to communicate with such media, and there is hardly any point in this, it is unlikely that there can be any benefit from this”, Putin spokesman Peskov said.

Condemnation of Mr Carlson for interviewing President Putin has been swift, with U.S. figures like neoconservative writer Bill Kristol, paraphrasing a meme to write: “Perhaps we need a total and complete shutdown of Tucker Carlson re-entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on” and former Congressman Adam Kinzinger claiming simply: “He is a traitor”.

Arch Eurocrat and would-be scourge of populists everywhere Guy Verhofstadt called Carlson a “mouthpiece” for Putin and “an enemy of everything the US stands for”, while sometimes Ukraine transgender army spokesperson Sarah Ashton-Cirillo said Carlson was the “Kremlin’s favourite court eunuch” and an “enemy of humanity”.