Tucker’s Next Move

The nonstop clamor of the media is about to get louder with the launch of pundit Tucker Carlson’s newest effort, DailyCaller.com.

A libertarian Republican known for his love of bow ties and a quick elimination on Dancing With the Stars, Carlson says his Web site will have a heavy dose of tough, original reporting.

“The press has sucked up to Obama,” he says. “The core of the site is to provide better coverage of the White House, Congress, and the federal government—because they are all doing more than they have since basically World War II.”

Operating as managing editor and with $3 million in start-up capital from conservative businessman Foster Friess, Carlson has set up an office in DC and says he intends to hire reporters and editors idled by newspaper-bureau closures. His partner in the project is Neil Patel, who was deputy to former Dick Cheney aide Scooter Libby.

Carlson will be gunning against sites such as the conservative Drudge Report, which, though waning, still has considerable clout; the left powerhouse Huffington Post; and even himself—Carlson’s a contributor to Tina Brown’s The Daily Beast.

Following the model of Arianna Huffington, he’s trying to coax those in the political arena to write op-ed columns for the site, free of charge.

Carlson is perhaps most famous for his 2004 showdown with comic Jon Stewart on CNN’s Crossfire, where Stewart said Carlson’s punditry was “hurting America.” CNN canceled the show soon thereafter.

This article first appeared in the December 2009 issue of The Washingtonian. For more articles from that issue, click here.

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Margaret Chadbourn