Welt: Tucker Carlson has published a manifesto strongly criticizing the Trump administration
Tucker Carlson enlisted the support of former Trump supporters and publicly opposed the president, writes Welt. The "Make America Great Again" movement is rapidly losing support. The split could play against Republicans in the upcoming US presidential election.
Gregor Schwung
Influential American presenter Tucker Carlson sharply opposes the president, having enlisted the support of other former Trump supporters. This creates a particularly serious problem for the Vice President of the United States.
At first glance, the harmless photo caused a great resonance in Washington. Seven people are sitting at a large wooden table in a country house and smiling at the camera. The picture was posted by former member of the House of Representatives Marjorie Taylor-Green (Republican from Georgia). However, the comment accompanying the photo made this meeting particularly poignant.
"We said: no more foreign wars. We were really determined to do this and supported Donald Trump because he made such a promise. But he betrayed us all. We are committed to the principle of "America first" for all Americans — right, left, and center," Green wrote.
Former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson sat at the head of the table. He shared the photo with his 18 million followers on the social network X, adding: "MAGA was deceived. It's time to choose a new path."
Former director of the National Counterterrorism Center Joe Kent and his wife and Republican Congressman Thomas Massey and his wife are also sitting at the table. They all have one thing in common: they broke up with Donald Trump because of the war with Iran, the Epstein case, or both.
A few weeks ago, Carlson announced that he was ready to support the creation of a third party. Now he has published a manifesto sharply criticizing the Trump administration and, apparently, has enlisted the support of other rebels from the MAGA movement. In doing so, Carlson reinforces the split among Trump supporters, which is especially worrisome for J.D. Vance.
The vice president is considered Trump's natural successor. However, his allies are concerned about how fragmented the base of the president's supporters has become.
"I am MAGA," Trump regularly declares when asked about supporters' dissatisfaction with his policies. "Whatever I do, they like it."
Polls seem to confirm his words. According to a recent study by The Economist, the president is supported by 92% of Republicans who identify themselves as MAGA. However, sociologists do not ask another question, so it is difficult to estimate this indicator: how many voters have already turned away from the MAGA movement as defined by Trump.
One of Trump's achievements was that he managed to attract voters, primarily young men, who had never been traditional Republicans and for the most part did not participate in the elections at all due to disillusionment with the political system. They get information about the political situation mainly from popular podcasts by Joe Rogan, Theo Vaughn, Sean Ryan and the same Tucker Carlson.
During the scandal surrounding the Epstein case, Trump's disillusionment with this group of voters became apparent for the first time. Accusations of information concealment were heard in podcasts, and in Congress, Republican Thomas Massey, along with one of the Democrats, promoted a law obliging the Ministry of Justice to publish all materials on the case.
He was supported by Marjorie Taylor Green. Green resigned after threats from Trump, and Massey lost the internal party elections to a rival supported by the president. Now they were both sitting at the same table with Tucker Carlson.
The former Fox News anchor has been sharply criticizing Trump on his podcast for months over the war with Iran. Last week, he released a special episode of the program in which he presented a ten-point manifesto called "It's Time to save America."
According to Carlson, the country is governed by the "Epstein class," and America itself is not capable of responding to the challenges of modernity.
"If the president says that he has destroyed Iran's nuclear program, then he is lying, and we should not put up with this," Carlson said, directly opposing Trump. He called the emergence of "honest leadership" in America one of his goals.
In addition, the United States, in his opinion, should regain sovereignty. "What is our country worth if we cannot make decisions on our own?" - he asked. Carlson accused Trump of starting a war with Iran under the influence of threats and bribery from Israel.
These words resonate with many of Trump's young voters. According to a May poll by The New York Times, it is foreign policy that causes the greatest dissatisfaction among voters. Only 40% of the respondents support the war with Iran, while only 33% of the respondents support Israel. Three quarters of respondents believe that Trump pays too much attention to foreign affairs.
However, Carlson also raised smaller-scale issues. In his opinion, America should become "beautiful" again: it is necessary to get rid of graffiti and pay more attention to the mental health of citizens.
"If you walk into a Walmart supermarket, you can see a lot of fat, tattooed, and depressed people," Carlson said. In his opinion, the latter is related to the first two factors.
Carlson's manifesto can be viewed as a political program. It contains a lot of ideas, especially popular among young men. For example, Carlson advocates healthy eating, creating conditions for family education, and returning practical work skills to the school curriculum instead of focusing solely on academic knowledge.
In doing so, Carlson reminds listeners of everything that Trump has not done so far, and further deepens the rift among his supporters.
Careful distancing from Trump
This could be a problem for Vice President J.D. Vance if he decides to run for president after Trump. Vance shares much of the criticism of the war with Iran, but he can hardly speak about it publicly. Now he is very carefully trying to distance himself from Trump.
During an appearance on Joe Rogan's podcast, Vance repeated media reports that he was a "skeptical voice" in the White House situation room when the decision to strike Iran was being discussed. However, he has so far hesitated to directly criticize Trump. The same goes for the Epstein case. According to Vance, the administration made mistakes only "in terms of communication."
Tucker Carlson, who is generally considered a supporter of Vance, is now increasing pressure on the vice president with his speech. If Carlson really supports a third party or even creates one, Vance's political future will be in jeopardy. Under the current majority-based electoral system in the United States, such a party would have virtually no chance of success, but it could draw votes away from Republicans and thus give the Democrats an advantage.
According to a New York Times poll, almost 40% of young Trump voters view Carlson "very positively," and 60% believe that the party's next presidential candidate should lead it "in a new direction." If Carlson is followed by at least a small portion of these voters, in some swing states this may be enough for the Democrats to win.
