Donald Trump’s many deals during his trip to the Middle East last week have rankled one of his closest allies on the right.
Tucker Carlson called out the president’s “corruption” on his podcast Tuesday while speaking with his guest on the program, fellow right-wing influencer Shawn Ryan. The pair were discussing their thoughts on the Trump administration, and while Ryan was happy with certain things from the president, such as his immigration crackdown and his war on DEI, Trump’s Middle East trip gave him pause.
“F— it, I’m gonna get blasted for this,” Ryan said, “but I see all these negotiations going on in the Middle East, and then I don’t know when these buildings were approved or when these deals got done, but then I also see like, ‘Oh, there’s a brand-new hotel going up in Dubai or Abu Dhabi. And another one going up in Doha.’”
“I’m like, ‘Did these just get done also with the deals that just happened over there, or was this earlier?’” Ryan continued, before telling Carlson, “You would probably know.”
Carlson denied knowing about Trump’s dealings, and Ryan said he thought the pundit was “a lot more on the inside than I am,” adding about Trump’s deals, “That stuff kind of worries me.”
“Well, it seems like corruption, yeah,” Carlson said.
It’s surprising to see Carlson offering criticism of the president, considering how close he is to Trump. He even spoke at a Trump campaign rally in late October, just days before the election.
Trump’s Middle East trip came with several announcements from his businesses in the region, as well as a $2 billion investment into his family’s cryptocurrency business from a firm backed by the United Arab Emirates government.
But the worst of it was the “gift” of a $400 million luxury plane from Qatar to Trump, ostensibly to replace Air Force One, which drew criticism even from Republicans such as Senator Rand Paul, Ben Shapiro, and Laura Loomer. Now, it seems even Carlson has some misgivings about Trump’s dealings. Does this mean that there are cracks in Trump’s base, or will all of these personalities forget Trump’s corruption the next time he panders to them?
The post Tucker Carlson Admits It: Trump Reeks of Corruption appeared first on New Republic.
