Axios says Tucker Carlson was trying to set up an interview with Vladimir Putin … 'but that's where details get cloudy'

As Twitchy reported, it was June 28 when Fox News host Tucker Carlson said on his show that a government whistleblower told his team that the NSA was spying on his team’s communications. A couple of days later, the NSA issued a statement saying that Carlson was not the target of any NSA investigation. There was some wiggle room there, though; just because Carlson wasn’t a “target” didn’t mean that his team’s communications weren’t being swept up in another investigation.

Now Axios is reporting that Carlson’s claims about NSA spying followed his team talking to Kremlin intermediaries trying to score an interview with Vladimir Putin. U.S. officials learned of this outreach … “but that’s where details get cloudy.”

New: Tucker Carlson was talking to U.S.-based Kremlin intermediaries about setting up an interview with Putin shortly before he accused the NSA of spying on him. U.S. gov't officials learned of this outreach … but that's where details get cloudy. https://t.co/5kbjMJnQ2r

— Jonathan Swan (@jonathanvswan) July 7, 2021

An NSA spokesman declined to comment and referred Axios back to the agency's earlier, carefully-worded, statement. In other words, the NSA is denying the targeting of Carlson but is not denying that his communications may have been incidentally collected. https://t.co/puTyIEUTEi

— Jonathan Swan (@jonathanvswan) July 7, 2021

That’s what people were reading between the lines in the NSA’s statement.

Exactly, so it's a nothingburger.

— Ian Miles Cheong @ stillgray.substack.com (@stillgray) July 7, 2021

I don't suggest there's anything wrong with this type of back-channel outreach. I often do it myself trying to get foreign leader interviews. I am trying to establish what actually happened at the collection end, and here I've reported what I could confirm so far.

— Jonathan Swan (@jonathanvswan) July 7, 2021

Let's be clear here: there is nothing wrong with the NSA (or whatever alphabet-soup agency was involved) intercepting this correspondence. Even though it was innocuous, it's the job of our intel services to flag this sort of stuff.

But leaking it to journos? That's utterly vile. https://t.co/RpuXIWxIhI

— Jeff B. tried to do his best, but he could not (@EsotericCD) July 7, 2021

I know a lot of people following me (esp. on the Trumpish right) will vehemently object to the first part of what I said above, but I'm sorry, the IC has an important function and coms w/foreign gov't agents falls into the net w/good reason. It's the other part that's disturbing.

— Jeff B. tried to do his best, but he could not (@EsotericCD) July 7, 2021

I can't know for sure, but I know enough to know that the way the IC works here is like throwing out a tight mesh fishing net that intercepts as much as possible (think giant Japanese tuna nets that also entangle dolphins but hey, remember that dolphins are rapists of the sea).

— Jeff B. tried to do his best, but he could not (@EsotericCD) July 7, 2021

They target externally for the very-much-most part, their tracing is on foreign government agents, not on Carlson. So if Carlson e-mailed one of them hoping to arrange a Putin interview (which is no crime, it's actually newsy if pulled off), no shocker they'd bag it up. Why not?

— Jeff B. tried to do his best, but he could not (@EsotericCD) July 7, 2021

The issue then becomes this: did the people who were reading this correspondence (which they legally have a right to and I strongly support on natsec grounds because again, it's a general capture here) leak contents to journos? If so: crime, repulsive, vile. If not, no big deal.

— Jeff B. tried to do his best, but he could not (@EsotericCD) July 7, 2021

The question then becomes whether Tucker's source on this was someone at the NSA who said "hey, we're catching your conversations here," or whether it was a fellow journo who said "hey, we got sent accounts of yr correspondence by the IC." Former: trumped-up BS. Latter: scandal.

— Jeff B. tried to do his best, but he could not (@EsotericCD) July 7, 2021

what did i miss re: leaking it to journos? how do we know an intel agent did that?

— Allahpundit (@allahpundit) July 7, 2021

How else did it get out?

— Jonathan Sabin (@jonathanwsabin) July 7, 2021

Pretty sure leaking the info to journalists is not just "utterly vile," pretty sure it's criminal https://t.co/wxaARMs2GF

— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) July 7, 2021

The details aren’t cloudy at all. The corrupt intelligence community spied on Tucker, collected his communications, unmasked him, and then leaked his comms to reporters who are now refusing to “confirm” what their own government sources admitted to them. https://t.co/cg4I4tLukK

— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) July 7, 2021

LOL at publishing leaked info on who Tucker talked to, admitting that the Biden intel apparatus magically learned about Tucker's communications and programming plans, and then pretending that the people who just leaked it all to you didn't just confirm everything Tucker alleged.

— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) July 7, 2021

I was told that @TuckerCarlson was just paranoid.

— Gay Pirate Assassin (@RichardWoodhul2) July 7, 2021

So Axios is reporting what it can confirm so far, but the details are cloudy. We don’t see Carlson backing away from this one.

* * *

Update:

Jonah Golberg is getting dunked on all over again for his tweet on the matter:

Can we get an update on this, Jonah? https://t.co/B1SNqPvpqf

— Aldous Huxley's Ghost™ (@AF632) July 7, 2021

The King of Wrong: https://t.co/nnEBw5RUL8

— IrritatedWoman (@irritatedwoman) July 7, 2021

Aged like https://t.co/9A63EcNuWH pic.twitter.com/ocKspFRxJa

— kc2fargo (@kc2fargo) July 7, 2021

Related:

‘Notice the wording’: Sharyl Attkisson breaks down NSA’s statement about Tucker Carlson’s spying allegation https://t.co/z1rEOuVZtr

— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) July 1, 2021