The hundreds of thousands of people who tuned into America’s primary tv channels on Thursday listened to how the January 6 insurrection was “the culmination of an attempted coup”, a “siege” the place violent Trump supporters mercilessly attacked law enforcement, creating politicians and staffers to operate for their lives.

On the Fox Information channel, nevertheless, there was a diverse acquire on the historic congressional hearings discovering the assault on the Capitol in Washington DC.

The deadly riot was, according to the channel’s primetime host Tucker Carlson, “an outbreak of mob violence, a forgettably minimal outbreak by recent expectations, that took spot much more than a year and a fifty percent ago”.

This was the alternate truth that Carlson, Fox News’ most-viewed host, presented as he opened his hour-prolonged show. He followed it up with a boast: the rightwing community would not be covering a single of the most consequential political hearings in the latest American history.

“The complete issue is insulting,” Carlson claimed of the primetime Home find committee hearing on the insurrection, which exposed devastating new information on how Donald Trump appeared to assist the assassination of his vice-president and how Trump’s supporters developed a “war zone” exterior the Capitol.

“In point, it is deranged. And we’re not participating in together. This is the only hour on an American information channel that will not be carrying their propaganda dwell.

“They are lying and we are not likely to enable them do it.”

What adopted alternatively was an hour of obfuscation, misdirection and what-about-ism, as Carlson, aided by a assortment of guests that provided just one person who was fired from the Trump administration soon after he spoke at a conference attended by white nationalists.

Carlson’s initially visitor was Jason Whitlock, host of Fearless. Whitlock immediately parroted what was to develop into the line of the evening.

“There was no insurrection,” Whitlock reported. “There was a riot, a little a person, that bought a tiny little bit out of hand.”

The scenes broadcast on other Tv channels manufactured this claim laughable. Non-Fox News viewers were looking at beforehand unseen footage that confirmed law enforcement officers being kicked and crushed, and persons carrying Trump 2020 flags breaking into the Capitol constructing.

Fox News viewers weren’t seeing those.

“If anything noteworthy comes about we will bring it to you right away,” Carlson had mentioned through his opening monologue.

It turned out that Carlson has an uncommon definition of noteworthy, provided that as the committee was detailing how Trump, on listening to that his supporters ended up chanting that Mike Pence must be hanged, claimed: “Maybe our supporters have the suitable concept. Mike Pence deserves it,” Carlson was merrily chatting with Tulsi Gabbard, the former Democratic representative who was railing against Congress passing a $40bn support bill for Ukraine.

Gabbard – who has stored a reasonably reduced profile given that she gave a spirited defense of Vladimir Putin times ahead of the Russian chief ordered the invasion of Ukraine – appeared joyful to join Carlson in downplaying what was taking area, insisting that Congress must be focusing on other matters.

Carlson fortunately took up that topic. A number of times he opined on why Congress was keeping this two-hour hearing when gas costs have long gone up, there are drug fatalities, and, most memorably, “this region has by no means in its historical past been closer to a nuclear war.”

Via the initially fifty percent of Carlson’s present, two techniques emerged: downplay the insurrection, and complain that the Home needed to look into it. As he entered the residence stretch, Carlson arrived up with a new, conspiracy-minded, trope.

“The position is not to get to the fact,” he explained of the listening to. “It’s to hide the truth of the matter.”

In accordance to the Fox Information host, the intent of the fee is to offer a pretext “for the Democratic occasion to declare war towards millions of American citizens who oppose their agenda”.

To help his point, these kinds of as it was, Carlson – finally – showed some of the listening to.

“Liz Cheney is supporting them,” he stated. “Here she is just moments in the past screeching about disinformation.”

Fox News slice to a clip of Cheney talking in an very measured tone about how Trump attempted to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election by a misinformation marketing campaign – a campaign that Cheney mentioned “provoked the violence on January 6”.

“She is off on one more world,” Carlson reported. “Why is Liz Cheney abetting the destruction of America’s civil liberties, and our sacred norms?”

Fox News usually has extra than 3 million viewers in the 8pm hour, but announced previously this week that it would not air the listening to, as a substitute relegating protection to the Fox Organization channel, which averages much less than 100,000 viewers.

The channel stuck true to its boycott guarantee. Often when Carlson talked a video clip stream of the committee would look in a minor soundless box, floating off to the right of the host’s head, but that was mostly it.

While the hearing rolled on, Carlson rattled by means of his company. A guy operating as a Republican for Congress explained people at the Capitol experienced reputable grievances above election fraud, right before conceding that factors grew to become “a little little bit dicey”. Yet another guest made imprecise claims about the total insurrection remaining cooked up by the FBI.

Carlson’s remaining interviewee was Darren Beattie, a rightwing activist who was fired as a Trump speechwriter following it emerged he had attended a meeting in 2016 alongside a distinguished white nationalist.

Beattie’s get – nodded alongside to by Carlson – was that “the feds” were being liable for the riot on January 6.

“It’s a crystal clear hoax, we know it took place.”

Carlson could perfectly have nodded. Last yr he hosted a documentary, Patriot Purge, about the January 6 assault which floated the conspiracy theory that violence that day was instigated by leftwing activists. Carlson has also proposed FBI operatives organized the assault on the Capitol.

As Carlson praised Beattie’s reporting, braveness and common standing as a particular person, it brought to mind anything Carlson experienced reported before, after he had put in a number of minutes criticizing the hearing with Charlie Damage, a writer for the rightwing Washington Moments newspaper.

“You and I entered journalism about the similar time, about 30 decades ago,” Carlson instructed Damage.

“It seemed honorable then. It appears actually shameful now.”