On Fox & Friends, Trump repeats Tucker Carlson’s claim that Justice Ginsburg didn't actually say her “most fervent wish” was for the next president to replace her

Written by Courtney Hagle

Published

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Molly Butler / Media Matters

On Monday morning, President Donald Trump cast doubt on a report that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s “most fervent wish” before her death was to “not be replaced until a new president is installed,” as reported by her granddaughter. Fox News prime-time host and Trump confidant Tucker Carlson had dismissed the report in the hours after Ginsburg’s death was reported Friday night.

On September 18, NPR reported that “just days before her death, as her strength waned,” Ginsburg dictated a statement to her granddaughter: “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed." Carlson cast skepticism on the report by saying that viewers should take it with a “grain of salt.” Carlson concluded that he is “going to choose not to believe that she said that, because I don't think that people on their deathbeds are thinking about who's president.”

From the September 18, 2020, edition of Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight

TUCKER CARLSON (HOST): We are just getting word that NPR is reporting, and so, with a grain of salt, take this please -- that on her deathbed, Ruth Bader Ginsburg said to her granddaughter, and I think I'm quoting, “My most fervent wish" -- as she died -- “is that I not be replaced by this president."

It's hard to believe -- and I'm going to choose not to believe that she said that, because I don't think that people on their deathbeds are thinking about who's president. You hope not. That's a pretty limited way to think as you die. But certainly, this will be used as a cudgel by the left, I would think.

Over the weekend, while many conservative media figures attacked the idea that lawmakers should consider Ginsburg’s request, a few conservative personalities also cast doubt on whether Ginsburg made that request at all.

On September 21, Trump repeated these claims on Fox & Friends when asked about Ginsburg’s statement by the co-hosts, saying that he doesn’t “know that she said that” and suggesting that the statement was written by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) or Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY).

Trump’s echoing of Carlson’s denial that Ginsburg made that statement is the latest example in the influential feedback loop between Trump and Fox News that continues to shape Trump’s presidency.