Conservative commentator Tucker Carlson criticized Donald Trump on Monday night, describing a social media post by the U.S. president on Easter Sunday as “vile on every level” and accusing him of threatening a war crime.
“How dare you speak that way on Easter morning to the country?” Carlson exclaimed during a monologue on his podcast. “Who do you think you are? You’re tweeting out the f-word on Easter morning.”
On Sunday, a significant Christian holiday, Trump shared a controversial post on Truth Social that threatened Iran’s civilian infrastructure.
“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah,” the president wrote on his social media platform.
Carlson’s sharp critique highlights a growing division within Trump’s MAGA coalition, with foreign policy hawks clashing with isolationists over Middle East issues.
Trump regained power by pledging to prioritize “America first” and end perpetual foreign conflicts, but his ongoing six-week offensive against Iran has disturbed some of his former supporters.
Trump’s message “begins with a promise to use the U.S. military — our military — to destroy civilian infrastructure in another country, which is to say, to commit a war crime, a moral crime, against the people of the country whose welfare, by the way, was one of the reasons we supposedly went into this war in the first place,” Carlson remarked.
The conservative pundit, a previous Fox News host and occasional White House visitor, has been increasingly critical of Trump recently, also condemning the president’s reference to “Allah.”
“So obviously you’re mocking the religion of Iran,” he said. “OK, if you seek a religious war, that’s a good idea. But by the way, no decent person mocks other people’s religions. You may have a problem with the theology — presumably you do if it’s not your religion — and you can explain what that is. But to mock other people’s faith is to mock the idea of faith itself.”
Carlson wasn’t the only conservative figure to criticize Trump over the Easter message.
“Everyone in his administration that claims to be a Christian needs to fall on their knees and beg forgiveness from God and stop worshipping the President and intervene in Trump’s madness,” ex-congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, a former Trump supporter, said Sunday.
“This is not making America great again, this is evil,” she added.
Milena Wälde contributed to this report.
