House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has provided Fox News host Tucker Carlson with exclusive access to the 41,000 hours of surveillance footage captured during the Jan 6, 2021 riot at the US Capitol, according to sources cited in a report by Axios.
The footage, which has not been released publicly, was handed over to Carlson’s producers last week.
The archive reportedly includes multiple camera angles from all over Capitol grounds and will be used to create excerpts for Carlson’s shows, including “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on Fox News and “Tucker Carlson Today” and “Tucker Carlson Originals” on the streaming service Fox Nation.
Carlson has previously downplayed the events of Jan 6 as the mainstream media angled the story, referring to them as “vandalism.”
However, he describes the footage as being “in the public’s interest to know,” adding that he cannot understand why “any honest person would be bothered” by its release, implying there is more to the story than mainstream messaging is conveying.
The process of providing Carlson with access to the footage began in early February, according to communications between the show and a McCarthy representative.
The footage was previously reported to be 14,000 hours, but sources have suggested that the archive is now much larger.
In January, McCarthy told reporters that he believed “the American public should actually see all [that] happened instead of a report that’s written [on] a political basis,” and Carlson has been pushing for the footage’s release, arguing that Washington has “a regime of secrecy and deceit.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) took to Twitter to praise McCarthy for the move, writing, “For all of you that doubted we would release the tapes. Here you go!”
“I’m very happy to be right again in my support for Kevin McCarthy as our Speaker,” Greene went on to say. “Americans deserve to see the truth, not a one sided narrative and unfair two tiered justice system.”
