Friends turned foes, podcasters Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson took to the stage at Turning Point USA’s America Fest on Thursday night, headlining the event.
Shapiro and Carlson, once Republican political allies, have grown apart in recent months, with each criticizing the other’s views, actions, and words on their respective podcasts. Infighting among those considered among the leaders of the conservative political movement has dominated headlines since the assassination of Turning Point USA Founder and CEO Charlie Kirk. The aforementioned Shapiro and Carlson, along with fellow podcasters Candace Owens, Megyn Kelly, and, to a lesser extent, Tim Pool, have been at the forefront of the controversies.
The feud continued on Thursday between Carlson and Shapiro. Kirk’s widow, Erika, kicked off the main event lineup on the first night of the convention. She was followed by Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson. Sandwiched between Shapiro and Carlson were actor Russell Brand and activist and author Michael Knowles.
Shapiro opened by scrutinizing Owens and Carlson and warning of the dangers of their rhetoric, ideas, and conspiracy theories. He accused them of undermining conservative Republican ideals and politics in exchange for their own fame and fortune. Shapiro identified both of them as being dangerous to the conservative movement.
“Today the conservative movement is in serious danger, not just from the left that all too frequently excuses everything up to and including murder,” said Shapiro. “The conservative movement is also in danger from charlatans who claim to speak in the name of principle but actually traffic in conspiracism and dishonesty, who offer nothing but bile and despair, who seek to undermine fundamental principles of conservatism by championing aggravation and grievance. These people are frauds, and they are grifters, and they do not deserve your time.”
Shapiro was also heavily critical of their supposed journalistic techniques, or lack thereof, when making claims without inducing proper analysis and presenting valid evidence. He scolded them for their approach to their characterization of just “asking questions” while discussing controversial topics and presenting these matters to the public.
“Our duty to provide you evidence means we actually have to do more than just ask questions,” Shapiro said in his critique. “Just asking questions is something my five-year-old does. And it’s really cute when it comes from my five-year-old, but when grown men and women spend their days ‘just asking questions’ without, you know, seeking answers, they are lying to you.”
“In fact, they’re doing something even worse,” Shapiro added. “They’re seeding distrust in the world around you, and they are enervating you in the process.”
Carlson responded later when he was on the stage.
“I just got here, and I feel like I missed the first part of the program,” Carlson said in his opening statement. “Hope I didn’t miss anything meaningful. I don’t think I did.”
“No, I’m just kidding,” Carlson added. “I watched it. I laughed. That kind of bitter, sardonic laugh that emerges from you when like, upside-down world arrives. When your dog starts doing your taxes, and you’re like, ‘Wait, it’s not supposed to work this way!’”
He rebuked Shapiro’s calls to silence himself (and others), categorizing them as antithetical to the spirit of AmericaFest.
“To hear calls for deplatforming and denouncing people at a Charlie Kirk event. I’m like, ‘What! That’s hilarious!’” Carlson said.
“That guy is pompous,” Carlson said about Shapiro.
Carlson then pivoted his speech from criticism about Shapiro to the tenets of free speech and its importance in society.
“I really thought that the impulse to ‘deplatform people,’ or even to use the word ‘platform’ as a verb, which it’s not, it’s a noun, don’t steal my nouns,” Carlson said. “Deplatform and denounce — ‘Why haven’t you denounced somebody else’ — the whole like, Red Guard, Cultural Revolution thing, that we so hated and feared on the Left, that we did everything we could to usher in a new time, where you can have an actual debate.”
“I mean, this was kind of the whole point of Charlie Kirk’s public life. I think that he died for it, I really believe that,” Carlson said.
TPUSA LOOKS TO DRAW A LINE UNDER ‘CONTENTIOUS’ FEW MONTHS WITH AMERICAFEST: ‘TIME TO GET TO WORK’
“And I know a lot about it because the last several months of Charlie’s life, were devoted in part to arguing about this event, in fact this speech, in fact my speech here, which he asked me to do earlier this year, this summer, and was immediately put under just immense pressure, from people who give money to Turning Point, I would assume good people, but who wanted him to take me off the roster,” Carlson said.
“And this has all become public, the whole thing is so sad that I never talk about it, except to say, Charlie stood firm in his often stated, deeply held belief, that people should be able to debate,” Carlson said. “And that if you have something valid to say, if you’re telling the truth, you ought to be able to explain it calmly, and in detail to people who don’t agree with you, and that you shouldn’t immediately resort to ‘shut up, racist!’ You shouldn’t immediately go to motive.”
“If someone doesn’t like what I think, fine with me, as long as I get to express it,” Carlson said. “That’s my view.”