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Home » Tucker Responds to the Israel Lobby Defeating Thomas Massie (Transcript)

Tucker Responds to the Israel Lobby Defeating Thomas Massie (Transcript)

Editor’s Note: In this monologue plus interview, Tucker Carlson reacts to the primary defeat of Republican Representative Thomas Massie in Kentucky, framing it as a pivotal turning point for the American political landscape. He argues that Massie’s loss represents a targeted effort by influential foreign policy lobbies and wealthy donors to reshape the Republican platform. Ultimately, Carlson positions this event as a definitive fracturing of the original “Make America Great Again” movement, signaling a shift away from a strictly domestic, America-first agenda.

TRANSCRIPT:

TUCKER CARLSON:

I was thinking last night when Massie lost in Kentucky, I was thinking back to Trump’s inauguration, the morning of the Trump inauguration, which amazingly was only last year, last January, January 20th. And I was in Washington for that, and Trump invited me to church on the morning before he was sworn in. And so of course I went and it was at St. John’s, the Episcopal Church in Lafayette Square, where pretty much every president has gone on the morning of the inauguration. So I showed up — happens to be my denomination, the Episcopal Church.

So I know the church pretty well. I know people who work there. So I was pretty excited about going and saying a prayer for this presidency. So I’m standing outside, it may be 6:45 in the morning and it is freezing. And if you’ve been to Washington in the winter, you know it’s mostly pretty temperate, but the cold days are very cold. And there’s something about the cold in a city that is biting, even if you like cold. It’s tough. And this was probably 12 degrees and windy.

And I remember that very well because we were standing in line, in a security line, waiting to go through the magnetometer. And the Secret Service was there, there was a whole rigmarole and dogs and they were taking forever. It’s not their fault, but the protocols are complex. And it was awful staying there.

They were kind of stamping our feet and grousing. Not many people, it was a pretty small church service, but the people standing in line were like, let’s get going and get into church. And as we’re standing there feeling freezing, waiting to be searched by federal law enforcement, a woman brushed by me on the left side, kind of walking fast, older woman, not very tall. And I recognized her and it was Miriam Adelson.

And she blew past me and everybody else in line. She went right to the front, right to the magnetometer, announced who she was and walked on in. And I thought to myself, Miriam Adelson, who I know vaguely, not really, but I knew that she was the biggest, or one of the biggest, donors to the Trump campaign. Israeli-born, in Israel, widow of Sheldon Adelson, the biggest Republican donor, the casino magnate. But more than anything, a fervent neocon. Her main issue is American support for Israel. She says this, it’s not a secret, and she spends accordingly.

And she brushes past me — I remember thinking this — and everybody else, and just walks right in like she owns the place. And I remember thinking, I hope this isn’t an omen. I hope it’s not a sign of things to come. It feels a little bit like a metaphor. I hope that’s not real.

So I kind of sublimated it, tried not to think about it. Finally got into church, sat alone in a pew with Charlie Kirk, had a great time. We were both almost jubilant, really, that Trump had been elected. We didn’t think he would, but he did. And we were thrilled, not just because we liked Trump, which we did — because he’s hilarious and fun to talk to and interesting — but because he ran on ideas that we agreed with really strongly.

And first among them was the idea, self-evident really, that the U.S. government ought to serve — in fact, it exists to serve — the interests of American citizens. And it really has no other role in the world. Doesn’t mean it has to strike a bellicose posture toward anyone else. Hurting other people isn’t necessary. But helping your own people is the only reason you exist, if you’re the US government or one of its many employees. And the American president should proceed from that commitment: I am here to serve my people, as a father does with his children, an officer with his men, etc. That’s leadership — service to the people you lead, and a love for those people.

And both of us were convinced at the time that Donald Trump was that man, that he was truly America First. And because he was, this would be a great moment for our country, a much-needed relief from a worldview that put America at the bottom of its concerns. But that would also change the Republican Party, which was meaningful because the Republican Party, along with Trump, had just taken total control of the country.

Both houses of Congress — House and Senate — the White House, majority of the Supreme Court appointed by Republicans. The Republicans were in charge. And we hoped, and at the moment we believed, that the Republican Party would change along with Trump, its new leader, and that it would change in one specific way: it would come to put the concerns of Americans first. Period. That’s it. We can argue about how best to serve them, but serving them has to be the goal.

Thomas Massie and the Promise of America First

TUCKER CARLSON:

And so we imagined — Charlie Kirk and I, we may have talked about this in the pew — that we would see the Republican Party suddenly populated by a lot of people like, well, like Thomas Massie. I can’t remember if we actually talked about Thomas Massie, but we had before. And Charlie Kirk had talked a lot about Thomas Massie.