Originally published April 26, 2023 7:32 am PDT
Tucker Carlson was reportedly ousted from Fox News following a speech he gave at the Heritage Foundation’s 50th Anniversary gala on Friday night, which contained religious overtones.
“God sends messages,” Carlson said at one point in his speech. “We can’t immediately translate all of them.”
Elsewhere he said that the “first lesson of history” is that “[n]othing is permanent except our own demise and God.”
“Cleanliness is next to godliness. It’s true. It is,” he remarked at another point in the speech, before later on suggesting to the audience, “maybe we should all take just 10 minutes a day to say a prayer about it. I’m serious. Why not?”
A source told Vanity Fair that Rupert Murdoch, the Fox Corporation Chairman, was “freaked out” by the spiritual talk during Carlson’s speech.
In his speech, Carlson discussed the situation in America as a battle between “good” and “evil,” and suggested that prayer was the answer.
He urged people to take 10 minutes out of their day to pray for the future.
Murdoch reportedly found these religious overtones too extreme.
“That stuff freaks Rupert out,” the source said. “He doesn’t like all the spiritual talk.”
The source also suggested that Murdoch’s discomfort with the spiritual talk might have been influenced by his former fiancee Ann Lesley-Smith.
Murdoch and Smith called off their engagement earlier this spring after she claimed that Carlson was a “messenger from God.”
During a dinner with Carlson and the Fox Corp chairman at his Bel Air vineyard, Smith read passages from the Book of Exodus, which reportedly left Murdoch uncomfortable.
“Rupert just sat there and stared,” the source recounted.
Fox News announced on Monday that they were parting ways with Carlson, causing Fox Corporation’s stock to plummet as much as 5% on the same day, wiping out $930 million in market value.
Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts shared a video of himself offering Carlson a job at his organization should he ever need one.
“If things so south at Fox News there’s always a job for you at Heritage,” he told the “Tucker Carlson Tonight” star.
“Well, you’ve saved me before,” Carlson responded.