Variety reports Zucker spoke at the Financial Times-hosted Future of News conference in New York. In discussing the general state of the cable TV marketplace, Zucker said he feels Fox News has taken a bad turn during the past two years with unquestioning coverage of the Trump administration. Even in the sharp elbows world of cable TV news, Zucker’s comments were surprisingly harsh as a blanket statement about a competitor.
“What has happened there in the last two years is somewhat shocking frankly. It really is state-run TV,” Zucker said in a Q&A with the Financial Times’ Matthew Garrahan. “It is a pure propaganda machine and I think it does an incredible disservice to this country.”
Zucker’s comments echoed the sentiment of former Fox News contributor Lt. Col. Ralph Peters, who resigned from his role at the network citing concerns about the quality of the journalism at Fox News.
“He said out loud what many have been saying about what Fox News has become,” Zucker said. “What has happened to that network in the last 18 months, especially in the last year, it has just turned itself over to state-run TV. Tass has nothing on them.”
Zucker allowed that Fox News has “a handful of really good journalists there but they are lost in what is a complete propaganda machine.”
Zucker declined to elaborate on his remarks when asked by Variety after the Q&A. Before he left the stage, however, he apologized to CNN PR chief Allison Gollust, who was in the audience.
Later in the day, Fox News Host Tucker Carlson responded.
Fox News’ Tucker Carlson went to war with CNN on Thursday over its president Jeff Zucker’s recent criticisms of Fox. Zucker accused Fox News of being “state-run TV” and called the cable news channel a “pure propaganda machine.”
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