Tucker Carlson said President Trump should be removed from office “immediately” if he continues to entertain the first use of nuclear weapons, arguing that reports of Pentagon slide decks discussing tactical nuclear strikes against Iran represent a red line no leader should be permitted to cross.
Speaking with Joe Kent in an episode, the former head of the National Counterterrorism Center, Carlson said he had opposed both impeachment attempts against Trump and does not personally dislike him. But he said the calculus changes entirely once nuclear weapons enter the conversation.
“The second any president actively considers first use of nuclear weapons, that person should be removed from office immediately, immediately,” Carlson said. “Because that’s got to be the red line, destroying all of humanity with a nuclear strike.”
Carlson said reports that Pentagon meetings on Iran included proposals for tactical nuclear strikes on sites like Kharg Island or Pickaxe Mountain should have triggered an immediate response from anyone present.
“You would think at that point the meeting would stop and the person in charge of the meeting would say, ‘Who wrote that? Who’s suggesting that?'” he said, adding that anyone floating such an idea “is by definition a lunatic” who “should not only be removed from any decision-making authority, but probably should go to jail.”
Carlson called it “a fair standard” that any normal person would accept. “Any leader of any country who suggests first use of nuclear weapons has forfeited his right to lead,” Kent said. “He has to be removed immediately.”
Both men argued that Trump himself has publicly threatened the “total destruction” of Iran’s civilization, statements they said could only be achieved through nuclear weapons, not conventional ones. Carlson noted that while the White House would dispute any suggestion Trump has floated nuclear use, his own social media posts describing total civilizational destruction amount to exactly that.
Kent said the administration has painted itself into a corner by demanding Iran’s total capitulation without a viable conventional path to achieve it, given the size of Iranian territory and the lack of political will for a ground invasion.
“You kind of have to use a weapon of mass destruction,” Kent said, describing the trajectory of the current strategy.
Carlson expressed frustration that Democrats have offered little pushback despite the stakes, and both men said Trump privately wanted to avoid war but was pushed into escalation by Israeli pressure and internal administration dynamics he never fully controlled.
