--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- Georgia Howe: Tucker Carlson is officially back on air, this time independently on Twitter. That's how most of us now live here in the United States, manipulated by lies, silenced by taboos.
--:-- John Bickley: We have the numbers from Carlson's debut episode, plus how Fox News is faring without their flagship host.
--:-- Georgia Howe: I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley. It's Thursday, June 8th, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- John Bickley: CNN CEO Chris Licht is out after just over a year on the job. What led up to Licht's exit from the company and who will fill his shoes in the meantime?
--:-- Georgia Howe: And the Southern Poverty Law Center unveils their 2023 hate map, which now includes some prominent parental rights groups. To be called a hate group after advocating an effectively changing policy so that all children are treated equal is frankly an insult to injury.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- [Music transitions to a new segment]
--:-- Georgia Howe: We have the news you need to know. Tucker Carlson's new show debuted on Twitter Tuesday evening, racking up tens of millions of views in only a few hours.
--:-- Megan Basham: I'm here to tell us more about Tucker's new show and where the Fox ratings stand now. So, I know a lot of Tucker's fans were eager to see him producing content again. Obviously, launching it on Twitter is something very new in the media world.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, what was his first independent show like?
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, I would describe it as a pared-down but very familiar program. So, Tucker on Twitter, and that's the official name, Tucker on Twitter, was short in comparison to his old Fox News program, just really barely over 10 minutes.
--:-- Megan Basham: But those 10 minutes were a supersized version of the element that was the most popular part of his old show, and that was his monologue. And he characteristically did not pull any punches here.
--:-- Megan Basham: This episode centered on the Novikovka dam that was blown up in a Russian-controlled area in Ukraine earlier this week. While the current media consensus is that Russia blew that dam up.
--:-- Megan Basham: Tucker cast some doubt on that. Blowing up the dam may be bad for Ukraine, but it hurts Russia more. Any fair person would conclude that the Ukrainians probably blew it up.
--:-- Megan Basham: It's not like Vladimir Putin is anxious to wage war on himself. Oh, but that's where you're wrong, Mr. and Mrs. Cable News consumer.
--:-- Megan Basham: Vladimir Putin is exactly that sort of man, the sort of man who'd shoot himself to death in order to annoy you. We know this from the American media, which wasted no time this morning in accusing the Russians of sabotaging their own infrastructure.
--:-- Megan Basham: So, a possible shot there at his former employer. And he then went on to criticize Senator Lindsey Graham and Republican primary candidate Nikki Haley for what he characterized as carrying water for Ukraine.
--:-- Megan Basham: And there were some reports this week that Fox came and removed all of the equipment from the home studio that they had built for Tucker in Maine.
--:-- Megan Basham: And workers are reportedly there building a new studio. So, it seems pretty likely that this short-form version of Tucker is only temporary and he will probably be airing programs that have interviews and full segments eventually.
--:-- Megan Basham: He closed out by explaining his decision to come to Twitter because it billing itself as the free speech platform. As of today, we've come to Twitter, which we hope will be the shortwave radio under the blankets.
--:-- Megan Basham: We're told there are no gatekeepers here. If that turns out to be false, we'll leave. And you have to think that Elon Musk does not want to see that happen.
--:-- Megan Basham: Tucker's debut racked up 75 million views by the next afternoon. Well, and Elon reposted it, so that probably helped those viewing stats as well.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right. Now, how does that actually compare to his old Fox audience?
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, it would be a massive understatement to say that it dwarfs it. Tucker was averaging around 3 million a night on Fox.
--:-- Megan Basham: But that's really something of an apples to oranges question, because views aren't really the same thing as ratings. Once a viewer clicks on a video and it plays for more than two seconds, Twitter counts that as a view.
--:-- Megan Basham: And if someone views a video more than once, that counts as multiple views. So, it's really kind of an imprecise way of gauging audience size, though I do think it's safe to say that it was probably a lot more than 3 million.
--:-- Megan Basham: But what there's no question about is that his absence has clearly hurt Fox. May was Fox's first entirely Tucker-free month, and primetime ratings were down 37% from last May.
--:-- Megan Basham: And they were down a whopping 62% in that key 25 to 54-year-old demo. That's the group that advertisers really care about. And his own slot was still down by about half in all viewers.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, right when the news broke that Fox had fired Tucker, a lot of pundits were speculating that ratings would trend like they did after Bill O'Reilly's ouster way back in 2017.
--:-- Megan Basham: Basically, then, too, there was a dive for a couple of weeks that then popped back up. Well, that's not only not happening here, Tucker's absence is hurting Fox's entire primetime block.
--:-- Megan Basham: And in fact, Axios reports that Fox sent Carlson a letter saying that his Twitter show violates his contract.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, Tucker's attorneys say Fox can't silence him because that would be a violation of his free speech. So, we'll see if there's any further action there.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, this is going to be really interesting to watch.
--:-- Megan Basham: Thanks for reporting.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Anytime.
--:-- [Music transitions to a new segment]
--:-- Georgia Howe: CNN CEO Chris Licht is out. After days of speculation, the embattled executive parted ways with the company on Wednesday, after just over a year at The Post.
--:-- David Marcus: It had been thought earlier in the week, according to reports, that Licht might survive a damaging feature in The Atlantic magazine and growing internal concerns about his leadership, but it was not to be.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Joining us to parse it all out is Daily Wire contributor David Marcus.
--:-- David Marcus: Hey, so was there a final straw here or was it an accumulation of events?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Morning.
--:-- David Marcus: It certainly appears as though the Atlantic piece and the recent rambunctious CNN town hall with Donald Trump tipped the balance here.
--:-- David Marcus: But honestly, Licht had been raising eyebrows inside the network for some time. Ratings are bad.
--:-- David Marcus: There was the whole Don Lemon fiasco in which one of the faces of the channel was abruptly fired.
--:-- David Marcus: Licht was shifting primetime lineups like the manager of a last-place baseball team.
--:-- David Marcus: But no matter the batting order, the results were the same. And he just hadn't built enough goodwill to survive the storm of the last month or so.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Can you walk us through exactly how this went down? It did come as something of a surprise.
--:-- David Marcus: How was the decision made and how did CNN employees find out about it?
--:-- David Marcus: It is somewhat surprising, though maybe not shocking. According to information obtained by the Daily Wire, basically Licht's boss, David Zaslav, head of Warner Brothers, conducted a call with staff saying he had met with Licht and that Licht was already out.
--:-- David Marcus: It's not entirely clear if he resigned or was fired or some combination.
--:-- David Marcus: Zaslav thanked Licht, called him a superstar, but said the job was always going to be difficult.
--:-- David Marcus: He also indicated that the search for a new CEO will take months, and in the meantime, a transition team will man the steering wheel in Atlanta.
--:-- Georgia Howe: By the end, Licht was taking some considerable heat from both ends of the political spectrum.
--:-- David Marcus: Is that part of what made the situation untenable?
--:-- David Marcus: Yeah, and he really was. I mean, CNN's been a punching bag for conservative media for quite some time.
--:-- David Marcus: And what was new was the sharp attacks from the left. Just this week, an opinion piece in the Washington Post was comparing Licht to Twitter CEO Elon Musk saying that rather than being centrists, they are anti-woke, elite white guys.
--:-- David Marcus: I mean, them's fighting words among progressives. There didn't appear to be anyone defending him.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Where does this leave the network now? Is it likely that Zaslav will look for another CEO with a new, bold vision?
--:-- David Marcus: Or maybe he just wants a more normal manager this time?
--:-- David Marcus: There's no doubt about it. There's a full-blown identity crisis at CNN.
--:-- David Marcus: It was only just over a year ago that they launched former CEO Jeff Zucker's brainchild, CNN Plus, only to pull the plug after a disastrous month of dismal subscriptions.
--:-- David Marcus: Then in comes Licht, promising to pull the network towards the center.
--:-- David Marcus: And thus far, not only has that been mostly superficial, it also has managed to anger the on-air talent at the network.
--:-- David Marcus: So really, the worst of both worlds.
--:-- David Marcus: According to insiders who were mocking him, Licht would often say, CNN will have people who love the rain and who don't like the rain, but we won't say it isn't raining.
--:-- David Marcus: It's a kind of milquetoast middle ground. Add to that the fact that he was known to actively avoid ever walking through the newsroom, and you just had a staff that was finished with him.
--:-- Georgia Howe: What remains to be seen is whether Zaslav's next hire will please the staff, and more broadly, whether that will be part of the goal.
--:-- David Marcus: Meanwhile, whoever takes the reins at CNN is staring at the edge of a cliff right now, so better make some sharp moves quick.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Dave, thanks for joining us.
--:-- David Marcus: Thanks for having me.
--:-- [Music transitions to a new segment]
--:-- Georgia Howe: The Southern Poverty Law Center has released its 2022 Year in Hate and Extremism Report, which lumps in conservative and Christian groups alongside chapters of the Ku Klux Klan.
--:-- Ash Short: Here to discuss the situation is Daily Wire senior editor Ash Short.
--:-- Ash Short: Ash, why are these groups, these pro-parents' rights groups, included on a hate map by the SPLC?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, the SPLC has long designated conservatives as hate groups for opposing leftist policies.
--:-- Ash Short: In this case, the organization added more than a thousand new groups to its hate list and included parents' rights organizations such as Moms for Liberty, No Left Turn in Education, Parental Rights in Education, and more.
--:-- Ash Short: What the SPLC reasoning behind including these groups?
--:-- Ash Short: Well, the SPLC claims the group sprung up as a part of a backlash to COVID public safety measures in schools which you may recall included extended periods of remote learning which hurt children academically and masking and distancing that kept children from socializing and even forced some to sit out in 40-degree weather.
--:-- Ash Short: The SPLC also claims these groups are anti-student inclusion and included an extremely watered-down version of what the left has been pursuing in schools.
--:-- Ash Short: Notably, the SPLC claims these parents groups oppose, quote, curriculum that contains discussions of race, discrimination, and LGBTQ identities.
--:-- Ash Short: What the groups actually oppose is the ideologically driven takeovers of their schools, like those helping to transition young children without their parents' knowledge and providing young children books containing pornographic material, including graphics depicting pedophilia.
--:-- Ash Short: Here's what Bridget Ziegler, vice president of the Leadership Institute School Board Programs, had to say on the issue.
--:-- Ash Short: The Southern Poverty Law Center putting out these hate group lists are really just an extension for the radical left's agenda.
--:-- Ash Short: They realize that they are losing power when they've had power over the K-12 education system for decades.
--:-- Ash Short: And because they will lose a battle going head-to-head on the issues, their only option is to diminish credibility for these parents who are just trying to fight for their children and their education.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So what does getting added to this list actually do to these groups?
--:-- Ash Short: So we spoke to Nikki Neely, president and founder of Parents Defending Education, another group that was added to the list.
--:-- Ash Short: And she said her main concern is how companies they do business with will respond.
--:-- Ash Short: We have seen tech companies over the past couple of years, Salesforce cancel the RNC, things like that.
--:-- Ash Short: And so we have been trying to figure out, will our bank be impacted by this designation? Will our email server be affected by that?
--:-- Ash Short: And so we're trying to explore that now and figure out what the fallout will be.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, accusing people of being part of a hate group is no small matter.
--:-- Ash Short: I think there'd be some legal action here.
--:-- Ash Short: Do we know if any of these groups are planning to sue SPLC over this designation?
--:-- Ash Short: It's a little early for that, but Neely did suggest that could be one avenue of pushback.
--:-- Ash Short: We are speaking to legal counsel right now about that.
--:-- Ash Short: But we're also, yeah, trying to just get out into the public sphere.
--:-- Ash Short: What we actually have done on behalf of children. Is it the fact that we have outed almost a thousand school districts across the country that have parental exclusion policies that prevent parents from knowing their children's gender identity?
--:-- Ash Short: Is that considered hateful? Is it the fact that we were able to get bias response programs canceled at a public school system outside of Boston, which chilled students' First Amendment rights?
--:-- Ash Short: Is that considered hateful? And so, yeah, we'd love to know the criteria that was used.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Sounds more like transparency than hate.
--:-- Ash Short: Thanks for reporting.
--:-- Georgia Howe: You're welcome.
--:-- [Theme music fades in]
--:-- Georgia Howe: That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us.
--:-- John Bickley: We'll be back later this afternoon with more news you need to know.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And don't forget to check out our sponsors, Black Rifle Coffee and Cynch.
--:-- John Bickley: Get 10% off your first order or Coffee Club subscription with code WIRE: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/
--:-- Georgia Howe: Download the Cynch app and get your first tank exchange for just $10 with promo code WIRE. Visit http://cynch.com/offer for details.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire.
--:-- Georgia Howe: We'll see you later.
--:-- [Theme music continues to play as the episode ends]
