Russian President Vladimir Putin has been interviewed by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, the Kremlin confirmed Wednesday. It is Putin's first interview to a Western journalist since the beginning of his full-scale invasion of Ukraine two years ago.
Carlson on Tuesday released a video from Moscow in which he said he would be interviewing the Russian president. Carlson claimed that Western journalists had interviewed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy multiple times but could not be “bothered” to interview Putin.
Putin has heavily limited his contact with international media since he launched the war in Ukraine in February 2022. Russian authorities have cracked down on media since the invasion, forcing independent Russian outlets to close and ordering a number of foreign reporters to leave the country. Two journalists working for U.S. news organizations — The Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Alsu Kurmasheva — are in jail on charges they reject.
Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters that Carlson had been chosen for the interview because “he has a position which differs” from other English-language media.
Peskov also rejected Carlson's suggestion that no Western journalists had submitted requests to interview Putin, saying the Kremlin has received many requests from large Western television channels and newspapers which, he asserted, “take a one-sided position."
Carlson’s position, Peskov said, “is in no way pro-Russian, nor pro-Ukrainian, but rather pro-American.”
The interview, Carlson said in his video, will be distributed for free on his website and on X, formerly known as Twitter. Carlson who was fired by Fox News in April, announced he was starting his own streaming service in December.
Multiple Western journalists were invited to Putin’s annual press conference — the first since the war began — in December 2023, but only two were given the chance to ask him a question.