Newsmax's Rick Santorum says Kevin Roberts “just sort of missed it a little bit” in his response to Tucker Carlson's “softball” interview with Nick Fuentes
Santorum: “I understand what Kevin was doing. I think in this case, he sort of missed it. And the real issue is Tucker platforming” Nick Fuentes
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From the November 3, 2025, edition of Newsmax's Rob Schmitt Tonight
ROB SCHMITT (HOST): I want to get to something else I want to talk to you about, which is this kind of — there's an internal thing happening with the Republican Party over antisemitism, this battle among Republicans right now. Tucker Carlson, Nick Fuentes on his show, which a lot of people have now seen, is a known antisemite. He spoke his mind very clearly. Some of the lines from it, the big challenge to unifying the country was organized Jewry in America. Fuentes also described neoconservatism as a Jewish-dominated phenomenon tied to Israel and oppressed Zionist Jews.
Now, the fallout from this right has conservatives split between the boundaries of extreme speech and antisemitism. And Kevin Roberts, who runs the Heritage Foundation — guy on the show, quite often, went out there and publicly defended Tucker Carlson's right to have someone like Nick Fuentes on his show and of free speech. Take a listen.
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SCHMITT: So I — you know, I don't think he's a bad guy, but he's getting a lot of grief over that —
RICK SANTORUM (GUEST): Kevin?
SCHMITT: Kevin.
SANTORUM: Kevin's a great guy. Kevin is a really terrific guy. But I mean, I think Kevin, in my mind just sort of missed it a little bit because I don't think at least most of the people out there that I'm talking to are not talking about canceling Nick Fuentes. And that wasn't really the issue. The issue was Tucker Carlson platforming and lifting up —
SCHMITT: Giving him somewhere to talk.
SANTORUM: And so, I think Kevin focused on a legitimate thing. And, right, we shouldn't be going out trying to cancel people —
SCHMITT: Right.
SANTORUM: But we at the same time shouldn't be platforming them and lifting them up. And so — and particularly if you're going to lift them up and do what Tucker did, which is a pretty softball interview for almost two hours and sort of let him do whatever he wanted to do without really going after all the things that Fuentes has done and said and is —
SCHMITT: Right.
SANTORUM: And that's the problem. And, you know, again, I understand what Kevin was doing. I think in this case, he sort of missed it. And the real issue is Tucker platforming.