Mark Hemingway: “The clearest sign that Carlson’s success has Trump’s opponents running scared comes from a Washington Post puff piece last week about the dubiously financed Never Trump PAC, the Lincoln Project. A recent memo put out by the group ‘cited Fox News host Tucker Carlson, as well as Republican Sens. Tom Cotton (Ark.) and Josh Hawley (Mo.), as other potential party leaders [the group] hopes to sideline.’ It’s one thing for a PAC to target elected officials. It’s quite another for the so-called conservatives behind the Lincoln Project to try to de-platform a journalist who doesn’t toe their orthodoxy.”
“So are Carlson’s stellar ratings and the fact he strikes fear in the hearts of Trump’s opponents leading indicators of a Trump victory in November? Well, just before Election Day in 2016, Trump super fan Bill Mitchell was relentlessly mocked for looking at flagging polls and saying Trump’s ‘ground game is in our hearts.’ If Trump pulls off another shocking upset, maybe we’ll look back at Tucker Carlson’s surge in popularity and say the ground game began in the living rooms of Trump voters, nodding in agreement in front of their televisions.”