The Fox News host spoke at the Family Leadership Summit in Iowa, a state that has first say in Republican presidential nominees

‘He could be a good president’: is Tucker Carlson the next Donald Trump? | Republicans | The Guardian

Tucker Carlson, 53, has been touted as a potential Trump heir who may launch a similar bid for the White House.

He entered to rapturous applause, flattered his hosts shamelessly, told them about his political vision and sold them merchandise bearing his name.

Tucker Carlson’s appearance in Iowa on Friday looked like a presidential run, walked like a presidential run and quacked like a presidential run but was most certainly not a presidential run, at least as far as anyone knows.

The Fox News host was the keynote speaker at the Family Leadership Summit, a gathering of more than 1,800 religious conservatives in Des Moines, Iowa, which every four years is the first state to have a say in picking the Republican presidential nominee.

It was at the same forum in the same state seven years ago that businessman and reality TV star Donald Trump told the audience that Senator John McCain, a former prisoner of war in Vietnam, was “not a war hero” – instantly dooming his candidacy, or so everyone thought.

Carlson, 53, another political neophyte and media celebrity, has been touted as a potential Trump heir who might launch a bid for the White House by stoking the same flames of populism, white identity politics and hunger for a man who says what he thinks – the more outrageous the better.

The New York Times has described Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News as “what may be the most racist show in the history of cable news”. It is also the most highly rated in prime time.

Carlson describes white supremacy as a “hoax” but has become a prominent conduit for its talking points, suggesting that diversity is America’s biggest existential threat. He has notoriously promoted the far right “great replacement” theory, which holds that western elites are importing immigrant voters to usurp white people.

Yet while he has embraced the nativist and liberal-taunting strains of the “Make America great again” movement, Carlson had been careful to keep some daylight between himself and Trump – leading some to speculate that he is carving out his own lane.

“He could be a good president for sure,” said Kent Proudfit, 70, attending Friday’s Family Leadership Summit. “I don’t know if he would run but he’s pretty popular. He’s got the biggest cable show in America right now. I’d definitely vote for him.”

Proudfit, a retired hospital courier driver wearing a “Trump 2024 revenge tour” cap that he got for free, said he was untroubled by Carlson’s lack of political experience.

“You don’t always need to have somebody that’s a politician; maybe somebody that’s in business just like Trump was,” Proudfit said. “We need a businessman and he’s done pretty good in business so that’s where I would lean.”

At the conference, Carlson’s warm-up acts were Kim Reynolds, Iowa’s governor, and Chuck Grassley, the longest-serving US senator in Iowa history, both of whom lauded the supreme court’s decision to end the constitutional right to abortion.

Taking the stage in a dark blue jacket, blue checkered shirt, blue-and-yellow striped tie and grey slacks, Carlson gave a 42-minute speech that ticked some of the boxes of a typical would-be candidate.

There was personal biography (“I was super unpopular in sixth grade because I had exactly the same views that I have now.”), compliments to the hosts (“Think I’ve been to all 99 of your counties.”) and swipes at the Democrats (“The other side is so menacing and so scary at this point.”).

Carlson also sought to clean up past comments that could be used against him. He has been widely condemned for voicing support for Russia in its war on Ukraine as well as for Hungary’s authoritarian leader Viktor Orbán.

“I’m not a Putin defender, despite what you may have heard,” he said. “I don’t care one way or the other because he’s not my president. He doesn’t preside over my country and what he does in Ukraine, while I think historically significant, certainly significant to Ukrainians, is not more significant to me than what gas costs. In fact it’s not even in the same universe.”

There was a ripple of applause. Carlson continued: “The rising price of fossil fuels is not an inconvenience. It’s the whole story. ... Cheap energy, cheap fossil fuels make the difference between living in the Central African Republic and Des Moines.”

He also bore some stylistic similarities to Trump in digressive, meandering remarks, sometimes with flashes of sardonic humour, that were more evocative of a man venting in a bar late at night than a politician reading from a teleprompter. Noting how Iowans have long been besieged by eager candidates, Carlson quipped: “I cannot even imagine being in my boxer shorts and, like, bumping into Beto O’Rourke.”

But he admitted that he is “no Bible scholar” and gave no hint of joining that throng as he expressed surprise at being invited to address the conference, saying: “Then I thought, no, actually, I’m the perfect person to come up here because I can give you advice for how to assess the sweaty people begging for your vote. Because if there’s one group I know well, it’s politicians.”

He argued that Republicans should choose a candidate who pays attention to voters’ core concerns, such as the welfare of their children, and who does not care what the New York Times thinks. Carlson’s speech went in esoteric directions, including reactionary gripes about modern architecture and an encounter with an underground bees’ nest.