Dave Rubin recently aired a direct-message clip of his conversation with Dinesh D’Souza to highlight what he called Tucker Carlson’s “latest” claim about Israel, framing it as a baseless conspiracy. Rubin’s move is the kind of inside-baseball spectacle the media and their center-left friends love—expose a private exchange, label a colleague’s questioning as dangerous, and declare the matter closed. Conservatives should be skeptical when a supposedly independent host acts more like a press censor than a defender of open debate.
What Carlson actually said—and what set off the outrage—was provocative: he compared terms like Judea and Samaria to something out of a fairy tale and questioned conventional narratives about historical claims to the land. His language was blunt, and yes, it offended many who view those names as sacred and historically grounded. But being blunt is not the same as being malevolent; Carlson’s pattern has been to push against consensus foreign-policy groupthink, not to invent facts out of thin air.
The backlash was immediate and fierce, with even Israel’s prime minister publicly denouncing Carlson as ignorant of history and accusing him of aiding enemies who chant “Death to America.” When foreign leaders weigh in on an American commentator, conservatives should ask why our media elites are so eager to weaponize those rebukes to cancel internal debate. Patriotism and support for an ally do not require silencing anyone who raises uncomfortable questions.
On the right, the reaction has not been uniform. Voices like Mark Levin tore into Carlson for what they see as reckless rhetoric, while others defended the principle that conservative media must allow fierce disagreement without immediate ostracism. That division matters because it reveals fault lines: are we a movement that tolerates robust argument or a faction that demands ideological purity enforced by social media mobs? The answer will decide whether conservatism remains a living movement or becomes a brittle faction.
Meanwhile, Carlson himself has not been shy about taking on fellow conservatives who, in his view, reflexively defend foreign entanglements or the so-called “Israel Lobby.” He has accused prominent figures of being too close to foreign interests and has advocated rethinking automatic U.S. military backing—positions that make some uncomfortable but that deserve debate, not summary dismissal. A functioning conservative movement should prefer argument and evidence over character assassination.
Dave Rubin’s choice to spotlight a private DM and label Carlson’s claims as “baseless” looks less like courageous journalism and more like performative gatekeeping. If conservatives want to win hearts and minds, we do it by marshaling facts and making persuasive arguments in public, not by leaking private conversations to score points against a fellow critic. The left does this all the time; we should be smarter than to imitate them.
Hardworking Americans deserve a conservative media that fosters toughness, not timidity. Carlson’s rhetoric can be sharp and sometimes clumsy, but the remedy is more debate, better evidence, and stronger arguments from his critics—not deplatforming by proxy. If Rubin and D’Souza want to convince the movement Carlson is wrong, they should make the case openly and let the audience judge, because the American people value frank talk over sanitized groupthink.
