Tucker Carlson has claimed that Boris Johnson demanded one million dollars for an interview after the former British prime minister accused the American journalist of being a “stooge” for interviewing Vladimir Putin.
Speaking with Glenn Beck of The Blaze, Tucker Carlson alleged on Tuesday that Boris Johnson’s team said they would only sit down for an interview if he was paid one million dollars.
A spokesman for Boris Johnson, meanwhile, disputed the claimed chain of events and insisted the $1 million payment would not have been for the politician personally, but would have been given to charity. It was further claimed, The Guardian reports, that Johnson pulled out of the interview after the death of Putin critic Alexi Navalny, which has been widely blamed on the Kremlin.
Carlson had said: “Boris Johnson calls me ‘a tool of the Kremlin’ or something … so I was annoyed, so I put in a request for an interview with [Johnson], because he’s constantly denouncing me as a tool of the Kremlin. He says no,” Carlson said.
“I’m getting more annoyed… I know a lot of people who know Boris Johnson. Finally an adviser gets back to me and said, ‘He will talk to you, but it’s going to cost you a million dollars.”
“I said, ‘I just interviewed Vladimir Putin — I’m not defending Putin, but [he] didn’t ask me for a million dollars. So you’re telling me that Boris Johnson is a lot sleazier, a lot lower than Vladimir Putin’.”
Following his controversial interview with Vladimir Putin earlier this month, becoming the first Western journalist to interview the Russian dictator since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Johnson branded Carlson a “stooge of the tyrant, the dictaphone to the dictator and a traitor to journalism” and claimed that the interview was “straight out of Hitler’s playbook”.
Tucker: "Boris Johnson calls me a tool of the Kremlin or something. So I put in a request for an interview with Boris Johnson. Finally one of his advisors gets back to me and says he will talk to you but it's going to cost you a million dollars. He wants a million dollars." pic.twitter.com/Y7qADbx2H4
— TheBlaze (@theblaze) February 20, 2024
The bombastic response to the interview from Boris may have been influenced by Putin’s assertion that Johnson, while still serving as prime minister, had personally intervened to block a peace deal between Moscow and Kyiv in the early aftermath of the invasion.
The Russian dictator asserted that Johnson’s intervention was pivotal in preventing an agreement from being reached during negotiations with top Zelensky ally Davyd Arakhamia in Istanbul in 2022.
“Prime Minister Johnson came, [talked Ukraine] out of it and we missed that chance. Well, you missed it. You made a mistake,” Putin told Carlson.
Arakhamia has previously insisted Boris Johnson did not influence Ukraine’s decision to walk away from talks with Russia, as Ukraine didn’t trust Moscow to keep its word. Johnson has also denied he was involved, calling the claim “total nonsense and Russian propaganda”, saying he had merely told Ukraine to “just fight” and that the UK was behind them “a thousand per cent”.
Boris Johnson finally responding to Tucker's interview request: pic.twitter.com/fl5Eb16waT
— Tucker Carlson Network (@TCNetwork) February 20, 2024
Since being forced to resign in 2022 amid the so-called “Partygate” scandals in which Johnson and other members of his government were found to have violated their own draconian lockdown measures by holding parties within Downing Street while citizens were forced to stay in their homes, Johnson has continued his advocacy for Ukraine and being a leading voice for more Western weapons to be sent to the conflict.
Last month, Johnson urged presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to “turn his party around” on Ukraine, and convince sceptical Republicans to continue financing the proxy war against Russia.
For his support, the former British leader has been rewarded with streets being renamed after him in Ukraine and has been the subject of murals and paintings celebrating his dedication to the Kyiv cause.
In addition to his Ukrainian advocacy, Johnson has sought to cash in on his time in office. Compared to his time in Downing Street, during which time it was widely reported that he was facing serious financial difficulties, upon leaving office, Johnson has raked in millions in speaking engagements, signed a lucrative contract to pen a column in the Daily Mail, and is set to become a presenter on the GB News network. According to OpenDemocracy, Johnson took in around £5 million in the first six months after leaving office, alone.
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