Tucker Carlson has received a 'cease-and-desist' letter from Fox News over new show on Elon Musk's Twitter, report says
- Fox News has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Tucker Carlson after the launch of his Twitter show.
- The network has accused Carlson of breaching his contract, Axios reported.
Tucker Carlson has received a cease-and-desist letter from Fox News as his new Twitter show poses a fresh threat to the host's former network, Axios reported.
The move comes as Carlson, who launched a new show on Twitter last week called "Tucker on Twitter," is embroiled in a contract dispute with the media giant, per Axios.
Axios reported previously that Fox accused Carlson of violating contract terms that said his services would be completely exclusive to the network until the end of 2024. Carlson's contract with Fox runs up until January 2025.
The debut of Carlson's new show aired on June 6. The show has received almost 170 million views after two episodes.
The move from Fox ups the ante in a heated dispute between the two parties that has become increasingly public, following Carlson's departure from the conservative news channel in April.
Carlson was ousted from the organization after Fox reached a $787 million defamation settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, which was baselessly accused of being involved in a rigged voting system that stole votes from Donald Trump during the 2020 presidential election.
Carlson has since taken to Twitter for his new show, saying Twitter's ownership under Elon Musk made it the last remaining platform open to "free speech."
In his first episode, which involved a monologue on UFOs and Ukraine war conspiracies, Carlson said the US public had been lied to "at full volume over a period of years."
The controversial host was a huge draw for Fox, with his weekday prime-time show consistently hitting roughly 3 million viewers each evening. In a statement to Axios last week, Carlson's lawyer Bryan Freedman said Fox News wants to take "Carlson's right to speak freely away from him."
Fox News and Carlson's legal team did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment made outside of regular business hours.