By Steve Neavling
On the day Fox News dismissed Tucker Carlson last month, the right-wing firebrand planned to spin a tale that baselessly suggested a pro-Trump protester was actually an FBI informant who started the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
In a video posted on Twitter on Monday, conservative columnist Chadwick Moore said he watched the monologue that Carlson planned to deliver on April 24, the day Fox News fired him.
“That monologue dealt with, among other things, investigations around Jan. 6 and, particularly, Ray Epps, the only person captured on video inciting people to violence that day and allegedly an FBI informant who has still not been arrested and charged,” Moore said.
Of course, Epps was not the only person captured on video inciting violence. Plenty of videos show other supporters of former President Trump encouraging violent mobs to attack police.
Epps, a former member of the Oath Keepers, is at the center of a baseless conspiracy theory that Epps was an anti-Trump FBI informant who incited the insurrection.
The conspiracy theory has been spread by Carlson and Republican lawmakers such as Sen. Ted Cruz and Reps. Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene.
The FBI has denied Epps was an informant or ever worked for the bureau.
On CBS News, Epps said the conspiracy theory has subjected him to death threats from Trump supporters, prompting him to sell his home and live in a secret location.
“He’s obsessed with me,” Epps said of Carlson. “He’s going to any means possible to destroy my life and our lives.”
Epps was at the Capitol on Jan 6. The day before, he was caught on video saying, “I’m gonna put it out there. I’m probably gonna go to jail for this. Tomorrow, we need to go into the Capitol.”
On the day of the riot, Epps didn’t enter the Capitol after seeing mobs attack police.
In the video on Twitter, Moore says he’s working on a biography of Carlson and has been told by people who “have intimate knowledge of the situation” that Fox News was required to remove Carlson as part of a $785 million settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, which sued the network for spreading false information about the presidential election.
