Tucker Carlson’s name has been on the tip of many tongues these past few weeks. His recent comments on President Biden’s announcement of more accommodations for female soldiers in the military, including newly designed maternity flight suites, his defense of Piers Morgan’s criticisms of Meghan Markle, and his attacks on Taylor Lorenz have thrust him to the forefront of political debate. This past week host of CNN’s Reliable Sources, Brian Stelter, took particular note of these recent controversies involving Tucker Carlson. On Stelter’s March 14th show, he posited that Tucker is becoming the new Donald Trump of American politics. Stelter says “Tucker has taken Trump’s place as a right-wing leader, as an outrage generator, as a fire starter.” Stelter continued, likening Tucker’s growing prominence in right-wing media to the Trumps rise in the years before the 2016 election.
This is quite a position for Stelter to take. His observation of Tucker’s growing popularity, among supporters and critics, is certainly not a revelation, but his comparing of Tucker to Trump is a quite a claim. It also begs the question of why Stelter would even want to speak that into existence. Considering Stelter has been one of the most prominent critics of Trump and his administration, why would he seem like he is almost seeking out a new Trump-like figure. One would think Stelter would be happy that Trump has finally been vanquished out of American politics and media. However, I argue the opposite; while Stelter and other Trump critics have spent the last five years lobbing criticisms and attacks against the former president, they actually miss his oversized presence in American politics. Trump provided the perfect target and constant generator of headline worthy news that pundits like Stelter constantly covered. Furthermore, the constant coverage of everything Trump was great for the most important part of television news media: ratings. Since Trump’s departure from the presidency, this has become very apparent as ratings fall across cable television news networks, especially for CNN. Perhaps Stelter, and other left of center pundits like him, yearn for a replacement of Donald Trump so the new controversies this figure generates can drive their ratings back up. Perhaps, they need a new villain.
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Many folks realized that over the coarse of the Trump presidency that media bias was extreme, obvious and unwarranted. The Media now has to come to grips with the reality that people have lost interest and faith in the main stream media outlets and get their news from more objective sources.
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