Fox News host Tucker Carlson contributed to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene ’s (R-Ga.) reelection campaign last fall, federal election records show.
An FEC filing dated Sept. 15 shows a donation for $250 to "Greene for Congress" and lists "Tucker Carlson" as the contributor and "Fox News" as the contributor's employer.
A source familiar with the donation told The Hill the contribution is connected to a bid Carlson placed on a rifle Greene was auctioning off as a campaign fundraiser last year.
A website for the raffle, which lists a Barrett M82A1 sniper rifle as a prize, boasts that the weapon is “the same type of gun that TRIGGERS the Fake News Media and Democrats all across the country.”
The raffle website lists the value of the gun at $10,000. Federal election law dictates any contribution of more than $200 requires a campaign to name the donor and their occupation.
It is unclear whether Carlson won the rifle after placing his bid.
Greene, one of former President Trump 's most vocal supporters on Capitol Hill, has sparked bipartisan backlash since being elected to Congress in 2020 with comments on the coronavirus pandemic, Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and alleged aggressive behavior toward fellow members.
In May, she earned a condemnation from House leadership after she compared COVID-19 vaccination and mask-wearing rules to the Holocaust.
Greene has repeatedly and falsely suggested that the 2020 presidential election was not conducted fairly to Trump and has defended rioters who have been arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol as “political prisoners.”
The firebrand Republican appeared on an episode of "Tucker Carlson Today" in May, and said most of the lawmakers elected to Congress "are not qualified to be there."
"They sound like losers," Carlson told Greene during the interview.
"A lot of them are losers," she responded.
Carlson, the top-rated cable host in the country, is widely considered one of the most influential voices among conservatives in media and politics. His segments criticizing elected officials, business executives, celebrities and other so-called elite members of society often earn blowback from media watchdogs and leading liberals.
The host’s three-part documentary series, released late last year on Fox’s streaming service, examines the Jan. 6 attack from an alternative view and earned Fox a rebuke from leading members of the congressional committee investigating the attack.
Carlson is not the first cable news personality or prominent media figure to donate to a politician's campaign. A 2016 study conducted by the Center for Public Integrity found people who identified as journalists, reporters, news editors or television news anchors combined to donate more than $390,000 to presidential campaigns that cycle. MSNBC anchor Joy Reid donated to Act Blue last February, federal elections records show.
Last summer, CNBC reported Fox News owner and media mogul Rupert Murdoch gave $1,500 to Sen. Joe Manchin ’s (D-W.Va.) 2024 reelection campaign.
Greene’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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