During the episode, Mr. Carlson said it was the FBI raid on President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, last year that turned him into an active supporter of the former president, who is the Republican frontrunner for the 2024 race.
He thought that President Trump was innocent of wrongdoing, he said, and that the raid and subsequent prosecution was politically motivated and unjust.
He clarified that when he was covering the Trump administration, he agreed with the policies but was not an active supporter.
“I’ve always agreed with Trump’s policies, always, and I lost friends over it. And I’ve never really actively supported anybody because it’s not my job to support people,” Mr. Carlson said. “But I became an active Trump supporter when they raided Mar-a-Lago. That can’t stand.”
“I agree with Trump on a lot, but even if I disagree with Trump on a lot, I'd still be a Trump supporter,” he said. “Because you cannot allow that. You cannot allow the regime ... the President of the United States, to knock the frontrunner out of the race. You can’t do that.
“It’s bigger than Trump, it’s bigger than Biden, it’s do you want to live in a free country with a functioning justice system.”
He went on to speak about equal treatment.
“By the way, if I had thought that he had committed some real crime, I wouldn’t feel that way—but he didn’t,” Mr. Carlson said. “He and Biden were both found with classified documents—him and every high-level official in history. But only Trump is indicted? Tell me how that works.”
Carlson and Trump
President Trump quipped earlier this month that he was open to Mr. Carlson as a running mate when asked on a podcast interview.“I like Tucker a lot; I guess I would,” he said on The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show. “I think I’d say I would because he’s got great common sense.”
President Trump had done an hour-long sit-down interview with Mr. Carlson in August. It was published on X, formerly Twitter, at the same time as the first Republican debate was taking place.
During the interview, President Trump, who has dismissed the need to appear in any of the Republican candidate debates, criticized his political rivals, addressed the events of Jan. 6, 2021, and touched on his campaign platform.
“I think it was a terrible move getting rid of you,” he told Mr. Carlson, referencing his departure from Fox News. “You’re No. 1 on television, and all of a sudden we’re doing this interview, but we’ll get bigger ratings doing this crazy forum that you’re using than probably the debate.”
