Tucker Carlson on Wednesday dropped his 10-point manifesto for “what America should be” just days after convening with anti-Trump conservatives, another teaser that he could launch a new third party (and a possible 2028 bid).
The podcaster — who publicly bid adieu to the GOP in June after breaking from Donald Trump over his ties to Israel and his unpopular Iran war — kicked off his latest episode by criticizing those who use power to “benefit themselves,” or what he called the “Epstein class” (named after the late convicted sex offender).
“The very first thing America should be is fair,” Carlson stressed.
He went on to assert, “But what rankles people so much by the [Jeffrey] Epstein story is not that he was bad. It’s that he got a pass because of who he was. The rules did not apply to him.”
Carlson argued that the law should apply to all the same way, a list that includes the president and his old pal Epstein. The administration’s handling of the Epstein files notably sparked intense backlash among Trump’s base.
“You have to have a consensus that no person gets special rights ever,” Carlson concluded.
Carlson’s message arrives after his assembly with anti-Trump war critics like ex-Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), lame-duck Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Joe Kent — the ex-director of the National Counterterrorism Center who abruptly quit over the conflict in March — at his Maine home over the weekend.
Greene shared a snap from the conservative conference on social media, declaring that the group backed Trump due to his “promise” that there’d be no foreign wars on his watch.
“But he’s betrayed us all,” wrote Greene, who, like Carlson, publicly quit the Republican Party in June.
“Our commitment is America First for all Americans, right, left, and center.
The movement has begun.”
Around the time of his own public Trump breakup, Carlson stated that he would “help build a third party” and do everything he could to “bring that about.”
But, he said, he wouldn’t run as the party’s candidate.
Greene has argued that Carlson could be seen as a “great threat” to both major parties should he decide to run for president.
Greene and others at this past weekend’s Maine meeting tried to convince Carlson to change his mind but, as Kent revealed in a recent appearance on “The Young Turks” show, he has decided against a bid.
“Hopefully he wakes up one day and Tucker says he’s going to run,” Kent said.