While Tucker Carlson fear mongers about the COVID vaccines, Fox & Friends cohosts just happened to make a point of endorsing them.
You probably recall that Carlson’s May 5 attack on vaccines was so unhinged that his own colleagues took to Twitter to counter the message. A week later, Lachlan Murdoch laughably declared that Fox News opinions are “center right” and “where middle America is.”
Since then, whether because of an employee revolt or as another attempt to woo worried advertisers that Fox is not promoting dangerous, radical extremism, or maybe in a rare effort not to look like blatant hypocrites, a slew of hosts at the network that has spent months fearmongering about and disparaging the vaccines have begun touting them.
Yesterday, Fox & Friends cohosts Steve Doocy and Ainsley Earhardt promoted vaccinations as a path to freedom :
DOOCY: You don’t have to wear a mask indoors. You don’t have to social distance as long as you’ve had the shot. The message is if you don’t want to wear a mask indoors around people, get the shot because according to the CDC, you still have to wear the mask, you still have to social distance inside if you haven’t had it.
EARHARDT: It is freedom. It’s nice to know how many times have you had to go back to your car to get your mask or back inside your apartment or back inside your house ‘cause you walked out without it. I’m still doing that.
Cohost Brian Kilmeade made a point of letting viewers know the show is still politicizing the pandemic by claiming that Mississippi, Texas and Florida are owed apologies because they were criticized for lifting mask mandates (we’ll see how well their numbers hold up in a few months). Kilmeade also took a swipe at Fox boogeyman Dr. Anthony Fauci. (Fauci is quite popular with the majority of Americans yet he gets death threats from those “center right” viewers after being attacked on Fox.)
Doocy ended the discussion with an emphatic recommendation to get vaccinated: “Now, the vaccine is what’s going to keep a lot of people alive, so when you have the chance, get the shot.”
But Doocy and Earhardt are not the only Fox hosts pushing vaccinations on Fox these days. Mediaite notes that hosts Jesse Watters and Dana Perino have also encouraged viewers to get vaccinated and that Sean Hannity has recently suggested he got the Johnson & Jonson vaccine.
Mediaite also points out that Fox has a PSA with hosts Harris Faulkner, John Roberts, Dana Perino and Doocy urging viewers to “wear a mask, distance where possible and, if you can, get the vaccine.” The PSA, which was published online in early February, ends with Doocy saying, “America, we’re in this together.”
Fox promoting togetherness is about as genuine as Lachlan Murdoch calling the network “center right.”
How many times has Fox aired that PSA? I may have seen it once or twice. I’ll bet a whole lot more viewers saw Carlson smearing former President Barack Obama a few weeks ago, for promoting the COVID vaccine after it was approved for teens over 16. Carlson called Obama “some creepy old guy telling your children, your little kids, to take medicine whose effects we do not fully understand."
By the way, Carlson is still hiding his own vaccination status from viewers. Anyone out there think that Carlson has not been vaccinated? Me neither.
You can watch Tuckums Carlson smear Obama for promoting the vaccine below, from the May 3, 2021 Tucker Carlson Tonight, via Justin Baragona. Underneath, you can see Fox & Friends urge viewers to get vaccinated, from the May 18, 2021 show, via Brian Stelter.
Tucker Carlson reacts to Obama doing a PSA calling on more Americans to get vaccinated after teenagers over 16 were approved to get the shot:
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) May 4, 2021
"Some creepy old guy telling your children, your little kids to take medicine whose effects we do not fully understand." pic.twitter.com/eQ5HX0TAv6
Some pretty clear pro-vaccine messaging from Steve Doocy on "Fox & Friends" this morning: "When you have the chance, get the shot." pic.twitter.com/W2COrl3HTF
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) May 18, 2021