Glenn Greenwald links Tucker Carlson exit from Fox News to Zelenskyy ‘blacklist’ of ‘Kremlin assets’

Award-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald blasted Ukrainian President Voldomyr Zelenskyy on Monday for “branding” a host of influential Americans as “Kremlin assets” in an attempt to silence their opposition to what he and others have characterized as a “US proxy war” with Russia.

“The Ukrainian Government issued an official blacklist of Americans, Brazilians and others it accused of being Kremlin assets due to our opposition to the US proxy war – including Tulsi Gabbard, Tucker [Carlson], [Brazilian politician] Lula da Silva, [Senator] Rand Paul, me and [political scientist and international relations scholar] John Mearsheimer,” he tweeted.

Greenwald linked to a July 2022 “This Week” article that claimed Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation, created by Zelenskyy, “compiled a list of American citizens who have been ‘promoting Russian propaganda.'”

The fiery tweet was in response to a scoop from Semafor reporters Max Tani and Morgan Chalfant, who suggest that the firing of Tucker Carlson was connected to a “previously unreported” phone call weeks prior between Zelensky and Fox News Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch.

“This article strongly suggests that the Murdochs talked to Zelensky, and Tucker’s opposition to the US proxy war in Ukraine was a major factor in his firing,” Greenwald tweeted. “I’ll await confirmation, but one thing is for sure: his removal eliminated the most influential anti-war voice from TV.”

“From the start of Biden’s war policy in Ukraine, the establishment wings of both parties were – as usual – in lockstep. Schumer and AOC have the same views as McConnell and Lindsey Graham,” he continued. “The only DC opposition came from the populist right, and Tucker was its key media voice.”


“The f**king audacity of Zelensky: constantly demanding more US resources and weapons – to the point our own stockpiles are depleted – then issuing McCarthyite blacklists branding American journalists and politicians (and Lula) of being Kremlin assets for opposing the US role.,” he later fumed.


According to Tani, “The Murdochs have not revealed which of Carlson’s many provocations triggered his firing, and there’s no particular suggestion that Zelenskyy — whom Carlson had called a ‘dictator’ — delivered the final blow.”

“But Carlson’s firing,” he continued, “will immediately relieve pressure on key Capitol Hill Ukraine supporters whom Carlson had criticized on air — and sometimes pressed behind the scenes to change their positions on the war.”

“The populist Republican right remains hostile to the war effort and at times openly sympathetic to Russia,” Tani wrote. “But none of Fox’s other top figures seem to share Carlson’s zeal.”

 

Melissa Fine

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