Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., criticized rhetoric from “MAGA Republicans,” Fox News, and their top host Tucker Carlson during a Senate floor speech on Monday.
Schumer alleged Carlson specifically was responsible for pushing the racist “great replacement theory” ahead of Saturday’s Buffalo shooting that left 10 dead in what authorities believe was a racially motivated attack.
The senator cited a report from The New York Times that made the claims against the Fox News host, who the paper characterized as dedicating excessive coverage to the so-called “looming catastrophe of demographic change.”
“According to one measure by the New York Times, Fox’s top political pundit, Tucker Carlson, has spewed rhetoric that echoes replacement theory at least 400 times on his show since 2016, 400 times.” Schumer said. “This is a poison that is being spread by one of the largest news organizations in our country.”
Schumer also blamed the propagation of the theory on “several right-wing outlets” looking for sensationalism and viewership, before proceeding to single out “MAGA Republicans.”
“The message is not always explicit, but we’ve all seen the pattern. Every time MAGA Republicans or pundits wrongly vilify immigrants and call them ‘invaders,’ every time they falsely claim that millions of undocumented people cast ballots in our elections, every time loud, bigoted voices bemoan the disintegration of a ‘classic America’ the subtext is clear,” the Democratic leader continued.
“These hard-right MAGA Republicans argue that people of color in minority communities are somehow posing a threat, a threat to the American way of life.”
A Fox News spokesperson told Insider that Carlson has repeatedly condemned on-air all forms of violence, including his promise that “we’ve been against, obviously, violence and terrorism since the day the show went on the air.”