Former Fox News star Tucker Carlson has dropped a teaser for an upcoming interview with Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian. As the MAGA fallout from the American bombing of Iranian nuclear sites continues, Carlson claims he has gone straight to the source for answers on some of the most basic questions.
Acknowledging that airing the views of one of America’s top adversaries is controversial, Carlson stated that the purpose of his interview with Pezeshkian is to “add to the corpus of knowledge from which Americans can derive their own opinion.”
In addition, Carlson notes the more routine nature of his upcoming dialogue which, he says, is not the hard-line grilling that viewers might expect.
“I didn’t ask the president of Iran… questions I knew I could not get an honest answer,” Carlson said. Specifically, he apparently didn’t think asking whether the American bombings on the three military sites targeted on June 22 were successful in destroying Iran’s nuclear program would be useful.
Instead, the interview will address more rudimentary questions like “What is your goal? Do you seek war with the United States? Do you seek war with Israel?”
The former host of CNN’s Crossfire has a history of interviewing America’s adversaries. Last year, he interviewed Russian President Vladimir Putin in a special that was widely criticized for giving “free rein” to the man who ordered the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Some responses to the announcement, posted to X, express fear that Pezeshkian is likely to barrel through Carlson’s admittedly softball interview without challenge—just as Putin did.
“So much for America First. For you Tucker, it seems to be Iran First!” wrote human rights lawyer and CEO of The International Legal Forum, Arsen Ostrovsky.
“Can you believe everything you hear from the President of Iran? Probably not,” Carlson conceded.
The head of the Tucker Carlson Network has made headlines recently for a “toe-curling” interview with Sen. Ted Cruz, in which Cruz was savaged for failing to know the population of Iran.
Carlson has previously stated that he believes warmongers within the Republican Party are behind the recent escalation of military action against Iran. The “real goal” of the GOP’s recent focus on Iran’s potential to build nuclear weapons is “regime change,” Carlson believes.
“These are scary people. Pray that Donald Trump ignores them,” Carlson wrote on June 5, prior to the American bombing of Iran.
Before the attack, Pezeshkian stated that Iran has no intention of building nuclear weapons but does intend to continue its pursuit of nuclear energy and research.
Carlson also announced that has submitted a third interview request for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is visiting the U.S. next week to meet with Trump. Carlson ”hopes" to be able to balance the upcoming Iranian interview with that one.
The interview with Pezeshkian is slated for release as soon as Carlson’s production team is “done editing it,” he said. “That should be in a day or two.”
