Tucker Carlson tucked his tail between his legs after President Donald Trump attacked the denounced MAGA star.
ABC News chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl shared on Thursday that Trump, 79, said during a phone call that “Tucker has lost his way,” after the former Fox News pundit criticized the president’s actions in Iran.
“I knew that a long time ago, and he’s not MAGA,” Trump told Karl. “MAGA is saving our country. MAGA is making our country great again.”
“MAGA is America first, and Tucker is none of those things,” he added. “And Tucker is really not smart enough to understand that.”
Responding to Trump’s vicious diss, the former Fox News host cowered in an attempt to stay on the president’s good side.
“There are times I get annoyed with Trump, right now definitely included,” Carlson told Status. “But I’ll always love him no matter what he says about me.”
Carlson, 56, has long opposed American military involvement in the Middle East, and reportedly tried to talk the president out of starting a conflict there, according to The New York Times.
Carlson was unsuccessful, as evidenced by the surprise attack Trump launched in tandem with Israel on Iran on Saturday.
Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed in Saturday’s strikes, and six American military personnel have been killed in action since the conflict began.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has not given a definite timeframe for the military operation, dubbed “Operation Epic Fury,” saying on Thursday that America can “sustain the fight for as long as it takes.”
“This happened because Israel wanted it to happen,” Carlson said on his show on Monday. “This is Israel’s war. This is not the United States’ war.”
“This war is not being waged on behalf of American national security objectives, to make the United States safer or richer,” he continued. “This war is waged purely because Israel wanted it to be waged.”
On Monday, Trump said Carlson’s opposition “has no impact on me,” and claimed that Iran “is a detour that we have to take in order to keep our country safe and keep other countries safe, frankly.”
“I think that MAGA is Trump—MAGA’s not the other two," Trump told independent journalist Rachael Bade on Monday, referring to the criticism by Carlson and another MAGA star, Megyn Kelly, who said she had “serious doubts” about the president’s hawkish strategy.
The president added that Kelly, 55, “ought to study her history book a little bit.”
“Some people are against [me],” he said, “and they always come back.”
The Daily Beast reached out to Carlson and the White House for comment.
