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  • 2017-02-22 (xsd:date)
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  • Did Tucker Carlson Hire an Actor When He Couldn't Book Protest Organizers? (en)
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  • On 21 February 2017, the Daily Beast published an article delineating a scenario in which conservative Fox News host Tucker Carlson unsuccessfully tried to book an anti-Trump protest organizer as a guest on his Tucker Carlson Tonight program, but was forced to settle for a participant when the organizer refused: The Daily Beast story, headlined Tucker Carlson Couldn’t Debate the Anti-Trump Organizer He Wanted, So This Actor Stepped In, soon sailed through the liberal blogosphere, where other web sites picked up on the salacious but inaccurate angle that Carlson had hired an actor to play a protest organizer because the real organizer declined. The same day, a blogger member of the Daily Kos community posted a story with the headline, Tucker Carlson of FAKE Fox News Debates an Actor He Hired to Portray Anti-Trump Organizer: The guest in question is indeed an actor, but he was not paid to play a protest organizer on Carlson's show. Shane Saunders (like many Los Angeles residents) works in the entertainment industry and has a long list of acting and casting credits. Saunders was verbally introduced as a participant in the President's Day #NotMyPresident demonstrations, but he was mistakenly labeled as an organizer in a screen graphic. It was an error that Fox News acknowledged in the following statement: The controversy kicked up when one of the movement's Los Angeles organizers, Olga Lexell, pointed out that Saunders was not an organizer despite being billed as such. She posted on Twitter a message sent to her by Carlson's show asking her on: Lexell told the Daily Beast she initially agreed to be on the show but backtracked once she spoke with other organizers, who were all in agreement that they should decline the invitation. She was unsure how Saunders was booked on Carlson's show in her stead, but pointed out he was not part of the group that organized the demonstration: Lexell did not wish the be interviewed for this story, and we were unable to contact Saunders. But Saunders told the Daily Beast he never claimed to be anything but than a participant: While Saunders was erroneously labeled as an organizer — a mistake which may have misled some viewers — we found no support for claims that Saunders was paid to play a protest organizer on Carlson's show. Instead, Saunders has worked as an actor and says he participated in the demonstration, two separate factors that were fused in a misleading way. Watch the latest video at video.foxnews.com (en)
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