Ukraine war: US senator blames Fox News’ Tucker Carlson for starting Russia’s bio lab accusation
- Members of both parties tell Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on authoritarianism that US must do more to counter misinformation from Russia and China
- Chris Van Hollen calls it ‘extraordinary’ for Moscow to be pushing US TV host’s claims while detaining a Russian journalist who protested about misinformation
Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, cited a Kremlin memo to Russian media published last week by Mother Jones, encouraging them “to use as much as possible fragments of broadcasts of the popular Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who sharply criticises the actions of the United States [and] Nato”.
The South China Morning Post was not able to independently confirm the veracity of the memo.
“It turns out a lot of the material that both Russia and China have used to make that propaganda claim originated actually on some right-wing, very alt-right US media and there was a memo that was surfaced by [Mother Jones Washington bureau chief] David Corn [saying that] the Kremlin sent a memo to the Russian media, saying it’s … essential to feature Tucker Carlson,” Van Hollen said.