'I Will Never Forgive Tucker': Geraldo Uses His Interview on 'The View' to Bash Former Colleagues
Well, that didn’t take long. Now former Fox News commentator Geraldo Rivera is already out making the rounds of left-wing media outlets and bad-mouthing his former colleagues.
Rivera has, of course, often been a shrill voice for the left on Fox News, but now that he has decided to quit the network after being fired from the popular panel show, “The Five,” it appears that there will be no holds barred as he flits about the media to diss his former co-workers.
In particular, Rivera focused on Tucker Carlson by telling the cackling ladies of ABC’s left-wing, daytime whine-fest “The View” that he will “never forgive” Tucker for daring to have opinions that run contrary to the left’s fake narrative of an “insurrection” on Jan. 6, 2021.
During his July 13 appearance on the late-morning talk show, Rivera gave faint praise to Carlson as “an excellent writer,” but then accused him of being a conspiracy theorist.
“I think that he is an excellent writer. I think that he was very charismatic in his presentation. He was number one for a reason, was a pretty good show. Then he drifted into this murky area where a swampy area where, you know, these conspiracy theories and it’s not just generates a whole bunch of different mucky kind of conspiracies,” Rivera told the hosts, according to Mediaite.
He then went on to obliquely accuse Carlson of being irrelevant after being dumped by the cable news network.
“Fox is a tremendous platform. And once you lose that platform, you’re kind of screaming in the wilderness and competing with a lot of other people who have podcasts and so forth,” Rivera said. “So will he be the same character? I don’t know.”
But Rivera insisted that Carlson’s actions on Jan. 6 are unforgivable.
“I don’t like to be unkind, but that what he did, just as I would never vote for Donald Trump, I will never forgive Tucker for what he did about January 6th,” the left-winger insisted.
Somehow, it seems unlikely that Rivera’s disdain will feature very prominently on Carlson’s lists of things to worry about.
Rivera also blamed a “very toxic” relationship with another member of “The Five” for his send-off from Fox.
The longtime commentator said he never really fit in ideologically at the network, but admitted that network brass tried to find him another program to join after it was clear he had to leave “The Five.”
However, Rivera said it would have been a demotion to go to some other show after being released from the network’s number-one show.
“If you fired me from the number one show, then I’m going to quit. And that’s basically what happened,” Rivera told the hosts of “The View.”
As to that unnamed person with whom he clashed, Rivera added that “his” opinions were always favored over Geraldo’s, and hinted that this person may have successfully campaigned to have Geraldo eliminated from the show, Mediaite added.
“Sure, and also I thought that it was very unfair that I was not judged objectively in our disputes but rather he was always favored and I was the one — I was suspended, you know, three times,” Rivera said. “My appearances, I had two, three appearances scheduled weekly, then biweekly, then monthly, then they kind of disappeared. They were canceled in the last day right before I was supposed to go on, so I was really ticked off.”
Rivera also denied having any serious issues working with Judge Jeanine Pirro, adding that he adores her.
After being fired from Fox News’ ‘The Five,’ @GeraldoRivera tells #TheView exclusively he left the network because his “ideology does not fit Fox.”
“If you fired me from the number one [Fox News] show, then I’m going to quit,” he says he told executives. https://t.co/cVclFZQmjA pic.twitter.com/xmTjjsGfvr
— The View (@TheView) July 13, 2023
Since being dumped, it is also clear Rivera has had a beef with Tucker for a long time. Even after Fox dumped Carlson, Rivera took to Twitter to bash the former number-one ratings draw for Fox.
“I don’t wish ill on anybody, but there is no doubt-as I said at the time-Tucker Carlson’s perverse January 6 conspiracy theory was ‘bulls***,'” Rivera wrote, adding, “Having lost the election President Trump incited an insurrection that sought to undermine our Constitutional process.”
WARNING: The following post contains language some may find offensive.
I don’t wish ill on anybody, but there is no doubt-as I said at the time-Tucker Carlson’s perverse January 6 conspiracy theory was “bullshit.”
Having lost the election President Trump incited an insurrection that sought to undermine our Constitutional process.
— Geraldo Rivera (@GeraldoRivera) April 26, 2023
Whether dumping Rivera was a good idea or a bad one remains to be seen, though it is hard to imagine he will be missed by too many viewers. But what does seem obvious is that Fox News is having serious problems. Not only is it bleeding its once-vast audience, Wells Fargo even downgraded its stock in the wake of its losses.
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