Tucker Carlson has issued a public apology for his role in supporting Donald Trump’s rise to power, telling his audience he is “tormented” by his endorsement and accepts personal responsibility for helping bring about what he now views as a deeply troubling presidency.
The former Fox News host made the admission during a conversation with his brother Buckley Carlson — a former Trump speechwriter — on Monday’s episode of The Tucker Carlson Show. Speaking directly about their shared culpability, Tucker told his brother: “You wrote speeches for him, I campaigned for him. We’re implicated in this, for sure. It’s not enough to say, ‘Well I changed my mind.’ In very small ways, but in real ways, you and me and millions of people like us are the reason this is happening right now.”
He went on to issue what amounted to a direct apology to his viewers. “I want to say I’m sorry for misleading people, and it was not intentional. That’s all I’ll say,” he added, acknowledging that he expected to be “tormented” by the experience for a long time.
The apology follows a dramatic and increasingly public breakdown in the relationship between Carlson and the president. Last week, Carlson sparked widespread attention when he suggested Trump might be the “antichrist” after the president posted AI-generated images of himself depicted alongside Jesus Christ on Truth Social. Carlson argued the posts mirrored biblical warnings about a “man of lawlessness” who would “oppose and exalt himself over everything that is worshipped” and “proclaim himself to be God.” Drawing on passages from both the Old and New Testament, he told his audience: “Here is a leader who is mocking the Gods of his ancestors, mocking the God of Gods, and exalting himself above them. Could this be the antichrist?”
Trump has responded to Carlson’s criticism with characteristic aggression. In a series of public attacks, the president has mocked his former ally as a “low IQ” individual, grouping him alongside Megyn Kelly, Candace Owens and Alex Jones in a Truth Social post earlier this month. “They have one thing in common — Low IQs. They’re stupid people, they know it, their families know it, and everyone else knows it too,” Trump wrote. Days later he returned to the subject, calling Carlson a “LOSER” and suggesting he “should see a good psychiatrist.”
The falling out between two figures who were once among the most prominent voices in the MAGA movement represents one of the more striking political ruptures of Trump’s second term.
