Conservative pundit Tucker Carlson took a shot at Fox News reporter Jennifer Griffin after she pressed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, also a former host for the outlet, over the Iranian nuclear program following U.S. strikes on three enrichment facilities in Tehran last weekend.
“Jen Griffin is a liar, but also very liberal — a true Trump hater, to the point where I complained about her,” he said during a recent episode of his podcast, first highlighted by Mediaite. “And I really tried not to complain about other people at Fox when I worked there because I don’t like that office politics stuff, but she was discrediting the channel.”
Carlson also suggested he tried to convince leadership at the outlet to oust her, claiming she's “too emotional.”
“I said to an executive at Fox, ‘What are we doing with this Jennifer Griffin person? She’s an idiot. She doesn’t tell the truth. She misleads our viewers, and she’s like a screaming liberal who hates Trump, who our viewers love,” he continued. “So, what are we getting out of this?’ And I was told, oh, you could not touch Jennifer. I don’t know what that’s about.”
Hegseth also chastised Griffin during a briefing with reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday after she asked how certain he was “that all the highly enriched uranium was inside the Fordow mountain?”
“Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst. The one who misrepresents the most intentionally,” Hegseth said.
Griffin replied: “In fact, I was the first to describe the B-2 bombers, the refueling, the entire mission with great accuracy … So I take issue with that.”
Several of the Fox reporter's colleagues and elsewhere across the media defended Griffin and praised her work digging for more information on the U.S. strikes in Iran. The Trump administration has overtly defended its decision to attack the nuclear facilities, though competing reports have emerged on how much damage was caused.
Fox political analyst Brit Hume called it “an attack she certainly in my view did not deserve. Her professionalism, her knowledge, her experience at the Pentagon is unmatched.
“I have had and still have the greatest regard for her. The attack on her was unfair,” Hume said.
Carlson has for weeks been ridiculing his former network over its coverage of the Middle East unrest, claiming top hosts at the network are trying to influence for the U.S. to get more involved in the Israel-Iran conflict.
Fox fired the conservative commentator in 2023 while news reports in the weeks that followed revealed text messages showing the former host disparaging leadership at the network and making controversial comments about the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and other issues.
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