The Trouble with Tucker Carlson

Why conservatives should not act as "useful idiots" supporting right-wing autocrats

This is another guest post by Joe Forgas. Joe is a social psychologist & Scientia Professor at UNSW. He has published dozens of books, including ‘The Psychology of Populism: Tribal Challenges to Liberal Democracy,’ and over 300 academic articles His prior post here was on the (dystopian) state of social psychology.

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Western liberal democracies have been under persistent attack in recent years by closed-minded left-wing ideologues who have taken over many of our leading institutions. Attempts to cancel, deplatform, and sanction anyone who dares to voice a dissenting opinion have been common in the media, in our universities, and in public life. It is all the more important therefore that resistance to such woke totalitarianism comes from trustworthy, well-informed, and objective opinion leaders, media organisations, and commentators.

As a refugee from communist Hungary myself, with painful memories of life under a dictatorship, I am highly sensitive to creeping totalitarianism at both ends of the political spectrum. I have therefore watched with growing concern the worrying trend among some conservative commentators, such as Tucker Carlson, who like many ’useful idiots’ in the past, are sycophantically promoting right-wing autocrats and illiberal regimes such as Viktor Orban’s in Hungary.

In a recent deeply embarrassing interview, Tucker Carlson acted as an obedient propagandist for Orban. Orban is a close friend of Putin, and is on record as a committed opponent of “decadent” Western liberal democracy and a keen admirer of “healthy” Eastern autocracies such as Russia, China, and Turkey. In Orban’s view, this represents the future of humanity.

Despite his recent exit from Fox News, Carlson remains an influential media personality. On the title page of the US magazine American Greatness (no false humility here), we find the following intriguing exhortation: “Support Tucker Approved News.” I doubt that we should trust Tucker Carlson to “approve” our news, given his promotion of right-wing dictators. Carlson must have been familiar with Orban’s disgraceful record as a populist autocrat and self-professed champion of illiberalism, who according to the Voice of America, has turned Hungary into the first dictatorship in the EU. In his interview, Tucker Carlson enthusiastically agreed with Orban’s bizarre claim that Hungarian media (ranked 87th by Freedom House) is actually freer than media in the US.

Orban’s rule in Hungary is based on a tailor-made one-party constitution, and new electoral rules that can give him a parliamentary supermajority with support from just 25% of eligible voters. He has placed his loyal acolytes in charge of major state institutions, turned most of the media into propaganda outlets, compromised the independence of the judiciary, and destroyed all democratic checks and balances. Orban has also created a thoroughly corrupt mafia state. His barely literate childhood friend, until recently a humble gasfitter, has become the country’s richest man under Orban’s reign. His family members are now billionaires. Orban’s son-in-law has been accused of racketeering and criminal conspiracy by the EU, yet Orban’s trusted public prosecutor Peter Polt has refused to investigate.

Carlson has also received generous support and hospitality from lavishly endowed institutions closely allied with Orban’s corrupt regime and supported by Hungarian taxpayers, such as the Matthias Corvinus College. Hungarian higher education is in a terrible state, and universities are now run by Orban’s subordinates.

Orban is not without friends. Donald Trump greatly admires him and recently praised him as the impressive leader of Turkey (sic)—a gaffe that can perhaps be excused in one so preoccupied with himself.  Orban in turn advised Americans to “call back Trump… Trump is the man who can save the western world.”  

So, why do some conservative media personalities like Tucker Carlson promote populist totalitarianism? Perhaps Carlson may have been taken in by Orban’s manipulative and dishonest political posturing as a champion of Christianity, conservatism, family values, and as a critic of woke Western decadence. If so, Carlson has been negligent and unprofessional in not doing his homework on Orban’s shameful track record.

Possibly Carlson, and others like him, believe that any self-professed critic of woke ideology must be their friend. Perhaps this could also explain the inexcusable sympathy for Putin by some on the political right. But anyone who believes in the foundational enlightenment values of Western liberal democracy such as individualism, liberty, and tolerance must resolutely oppose all enemies of human freedom, whether they claim to represent left-wing or right-wing ideologies.

Of course, Hungary is not an important country, providing barely 0.8% of the EU’s GDP. Yet Carlson’s activism and the naïveté of other conservatives does matter. Orbán has many followers in Central and Eastern Europe, and he is actively promoting illiberalism and autocracy in the Balkans. For his efforts, Trump  showered him with exuberant praise for doing such a “tremendous job” during a White House visit in 2019.

Unfortunately, Tucker Carlson is not alone in falling under Orban’s sway. Orban was a keynote speaker at the Conservative Political Action conference held in Budapest. He also appeared at a CPAC event in Texas last August, where he received a very warm reception.

It is profoundly disappointing that some Western conservatives have—perhaps inadvertently—legitimized Orbán’s regime. Douglas Murray accepted the hospitality of Orban’s Danube Institute, and Roger Scruton received a medal from Orban. Conservative academics from the US and Europe flock to richly rewarding junkets organized by Matthias Corvinus College and other Orbánite front organizations squandering Hungarian taxpayers’ money.

The growing backlash against woke tyranny, political correctness, and gender ideology led Orbán to realize that attacking neo-marxist totalitarianism can yield significant conservative support in the West. Yet Orbán’s regime is built on exactly the same sort of tribal intolerance routinely employed by left-wing autocrats. Those who value liberty, individualism, and rationality cannot make common cause with right-wing autocrats who are openly disdainful of our basic values. Orban has excluded himself from the democratic West, and he and his government should be treated accordingly. Those who support freedom and oppose left-wing totalitarianism must not allow ourselves to be manipulated by crafty aurocrats like Orban and naive apologists like Tucker Carlson.