Tucker Carlson Claims U.S. Government 'Prevented' Him From Interviewing Vladimir Putin in 2021 — NSA Denies Those Claims
The National Security Agency dismissed Tucker Carlson’s recent claim that the U.S. government interfered with his initial attempt to interview Vladimir Putin three years ago.
Feb. 13 2024, Published 9:00 a.m. ET
The National Security Agency dismissed Tucker Carlson’s recent claim that the U.S. government interfered with his initial attempt to interview Vladimir Putin three years ago, RadarOnline.com can report.
In a surprising development to come after Carlson interviewed the Russian despot in Moscow earlier this month, the fired Fox News host claimed that he initially attempted to meet with Putin in 2021.
But according to Carlson, that interview was canceled after the NSA “spied” on his text messages and “leaked” the messages to the New York Times.
“I’ve been trying for three years to do this interview,” Carlson said at the World Governments Summit in Dubai on Monday. “The U.S. government prevented me from doing it by spying on my text messages and leaking them to The New York Times.”
“And that spooked the Russian government into canceling the interview,” he claimed.
Carlson was likely referring to an alleged incident that transpired in June 2021.
Carlson raved about his grocery shopping experience in Russia.
Carlson, who was still working at Fox News at the time, told his viewers that a “whistleblower” contacted his show and claimed that the NSA was “monitoring our electronic communications” and “planning to leak them in an attempt to take this show off the air.”
He also claimed that the alleged whistleblower “repeated back to us information about a story that we are working on that could have only come directly from my texts and e-mails.”
“There's no other possible source for that information,” the then-Fox News host said in June 2021. “Period.”
Meanwhile, the NSA issued a rare statement at the time and denied Carlson’s eavesdropping allegations.
“And that spooked the Russian government into canceling the interview,” Carlson claimed.
“Tucker Carlson has never been an intelligence target of the agency and the NSA has never had any plans to try to take his program off the air,” a spokesperson for the agency said three years ago.
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Robert Storch, the NSA’s inspector general, then announced in August 2021 that the agency was launching an investigation into Carlson’s shocking allegations.
“The OIG is examining NSA’s compliance with applicable legal authorities and agency policies and procedures regarding collection, analysis, reporting, and dissemination activities, including unmasking procedures, and whether any such actions were based upon improper considerations,” Storch announced in August 2021.
Carlson traveled to Moscow earlier this month and successfully scored his interview with Putin on February 6.
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A spokesperson for Fox News also criticized the NSA at the time and slammed the agency for allegedly working to interfere with Carlson’s first attempt to interview Putin.
"For the NSA to unmask Tucker Carlson or any journalist attempting to secure a newsworthy interview is entirely unacceptable and raises serious questions about their activities as well as their original denial, which was wildly misleading," the Fox spokesperson charged.
As RadarOnline.com previously reported, Carlson ultimately traveled to Moscow earlier this month and successfully scored his interview with the Russian tyrant on February 6.
Although the pair discussed several issues during the two-hour interview – including the war in Ukraine, former President Bill Clinton, jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, and the CIA – neither Putin nor Carlson mentioned their previous attempts to hold an interview three years ago.
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