MSNBC's Carlson Changes Tune on Bathroom Assault Story
For original press release from Media Matters click here.
New Statement Apparently Conflicts with Previous On-Air Comments, Raising Questions
Washington, DC - Today, MSNBC host Tucker Carlson issued a statement responding to criticism of his on-air comments last night that he assaulted a man who he said "bothered" him in a public restroom in Washington, D.C., as Media Matters for America documented. Carlson's statement from today appears to conflict with his comments from last night.
His statement from today is as follows, with emphasis added:
"Let me be clear about an incident I referred to on MSNBC last night: In the mid-1980s, while I was a high school student, a man physically grabbed me in a men's room in Washington, DC. I yelled, pulled away from him and ran out of the room. Twenty-five minutes later, a friend of mine and I returned to the men's room. The man was still there, presumably waiting to do to someone else what he had done to me. My friend and I seized the man and held him until a security guard arrived."
"Several bloggers have characterized this is a sort of gay bashing. That's absurd, and an insult to anybody who has fought back against an unsolicited sexual attack. I wasn't angry with the man because he was gay. I was angry because he assaulted me."
During the August 28 broadcast of MSNBC's Live with Dan Abrams, Carlson asserted, "I went back with someone I knew and grabbed the guy by the -- you know, and grabbed him, and ... [h]it him against the stall with his head, actually. And then the cops came and arrested him."
Transcript from the August 28 edition of MSNBC's Live with Dan Abrams at 9 p.m. ET
CARLSON: I went back with someone I knew and grabbed the guy by the -- you know, and grabbed him, and -- and --
ABRAMS: And did what?
CARLSON: Hit him against the stall with his head, actually!
[laughter]
CARLSON: And then the cops came and arrested him. But let me say that I'm the least anti-gay right-winger you'll ever meet --
More from Media Matters for America...
On the August 28 edition of MSBNC Live, hosted by MSNBC general manager Dan Abrams, Tucker Carlson, host of MSNBC's Tucker, asserted, "Having sex in a public men's room is outrageous. It's also really common. I've been bothered in men's rooms." Carlson continued, "I've been bothered in Georgetown Park," in Washington, D.C., "when I was in high school." When Abrams asked how Carlson responded to being "bothered," Carlson asserted, "I went back with someone I knew and grabbed the guy by the -- you know, and grabbed him, and ... hit him against the stall with his head, actually."
###
RSS Feeds
