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Tucker Carlson<\/strong> finally has his white whale. On Tuesday, the former Fox News host announced that he\u2019d soon be recording an interview with Russian president Vladimir Putin<\/strong> in Moscow. The interview is the first that Putin has granted to a Western media figure since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine nearly two years ago, a fact that Carlson touted in the video he released to tease the meeting. In truth, many Western journalists have requested interviews with Putin to no avail, presumably because they would challenge a leader accustomed to interviews with propagandists on the Kremlin\u2019s payroll.\u00a0<\/p>\n Carlson, meanwhile, has built his post-television brand on friendly sit-downs with far-right and authoritarian leaders worldwide. \u201c[American] media outlets are corrupt,\u201d he\u00a0said<\/a>\u00a0in the teaser video.\u00a0\u201cAt the same time our politicians and media outlets have been\u2026promoting [Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy<\/strong>] like he\u2019s a new consumer brand,\u201d he continued, \u201cnot a single Western journalist has bothered to interview the president of the other<\/em> country involved in this conflict: Vladimir Putin.\u201d<\/p>\n Carlson\u2019s suggestion that Western journalists are somehow incurious about reporting from Russia is easily disproved by the case of\u00a0Evan Gershkovich,<\/strong>\u00a0a Wall Street Journal<\/em> reporter who was arrested in Yekaterinburg last March on dubious espionage charges. He remains behind bars. Many foreign journalists were also forced out of or\u00a0banned<\/a>\u00a0from the country as part of Russia\u2019s response to Western sanctions. In a post on X, CNN anchor\u00a0Christiane Amanpour<\/strong>\u00a0wrote<\/a>, \u201cIt\u2019s absurd — we\u2019ll continue to ask for an interview, just as we have for years now.\u201d<\/p>\n Although he was no doubt partially responsible for Carlson\u2019s visit, even Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov<\/strong> had to counter Carlson\u2019s claim. \u201cMr. Carlson is wrong,\u201d he said<\/a> during a Wednesday presser. \u201cWe receive a lot of applications for interviews with the president.\u201d\u00a0However, the requests from prominent Western outlets have all been rejected, Peskov explained<\/a>, as there would be \u201cno benefit in giving them interviews.\u201d<\/p>\n Why the Kremlin would open its doors to Carlson is eminently clear: He has opposed US aid to Kyiv and is arguably more responsible than any other American for exciting anti-Ukraine and pro-Russia sentiment among the \u201cAmerica First,\u201d Trump-aligned wing of the Republican Party. In Carlson\u2019s telling<\/a>, Putin\u2019s Russia is a defender of Christendom, standing steadfastly against the anti-Christian West.<\/p>\n Carlson has also been sympathetic to Putin throughout his war with Ukraine, often producing monologues so favorable to Russia that its state-run outlets translate and rebroadcast<\/a> them. Following Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, a leaked Kremlin memo stated<\/a> that it was essential to air \u201cbroadcasts of the popular Fox News host Tucker Carlson.\u201d Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov<\/strong> even condemned Carlson\u2019s firing from Fox News last year, falsely suggesting that it amounted to a violation of the First Amendment.<\/p>\n Peskov all but acknowledged this relationship when explaining why the Kremlin approved the interview, which reportedly<\/a> could air on Thursday. Carlson\u2019s \u201cposition\u201d on Russia, Peskov noted, is \u201cdifferent from\u201d that of other \u201cAnglo-Saxon media.\u201d Indeed, while discussing Russo-Ukrainian tensions in 2019, Carlson declared<\/a> on Fox News: \u201cWhy shouldn\u2019t I root for Russia? Which I am.\u201d<\/p>\n The list of other authoritarian leaders whom Carlson has interviewed includes Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n;<\/strong> El Salvador\u2019s president, Nayib Bukele;<\/strong> Polish president Andrzej Duda;<\/strong> and Jair Bolsonaro,<\/strong> the former president of Brazil who allegedly orchestrated<\/a> a failed self-coup last year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n