“The richest companies in the world are being defended by conservative nonprofits as they attack conservatives.” — Tucker Carlson, host “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Fox News
Friday on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” Fox News host Tucker Carlson accused Koch brother-funded conservative organizations of helping Google, Facebook, and Twitter suppress conservative speech on the Internet.
Carlson pointed to a recent report (“Google and the Koch Network: A Troubling Alliance of Convenience” published by the Campaign for Accountability) that found 22 Koch-funded conservative organizations including Americans for Prosperity, the Heritage Foundation, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the American Conservative Union, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and the Mercatus Center have been colluding with giant social media monopolies to shield the giants from government oversight.
“Here’s how it works. Big Tech companies silence conservatives; conservative nonprofits try to prevent the government from doing anything about it.” — Tucker Carlson, host “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Fox News
The nonprofit conservative champions in Washington, D.C., which reputedly uphold and defend conservative ideas and causes, actually aren’t defending conservatives; they’re really defending Big Tech.
“They [conservative nonprofits] make deals with people who hate you [conservatives]. They secretly sell out your interests; then they beg you to tithe like its the medieval church.” — Tucker Carlson
The Koch brothers network has secretly funneled at least $10 million into defending Silicon Valley companies, which have been silencing conservative voices and censoring conservative speech over the Internet.
“As one former Koch employee recently told this show, quote, ‘I know for a fact they take money from social media companies to do their bidding.'” — Tucker Carlson
Carlson said the Competitive Enterprise Institute and three other groups, which are bankrolled by Google and the Koch brothers, sent a joint letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions in September 2018 expressing their dismay over the Justice Department’s intentions to investigate the Internet giants for squashing competitors and stifling speech.
Carlson then called out the Heritage Foundation, the “biggest and best-funded think tank in Washington,” for carrying Big Tech’s water rather than looking out for the interests of conservatives.
According to Carlson, Heritage defends Silicon Valley’s special privileges when it argues that conservatives can simply “start their own Google” if they don’t like what the tech giant is doing.
The Heritage Foundation fired back at Carlson’s allegations in a statement accusing him of making “several false, outrageous, and unfounded accusations” on Friday’s show.
“We won’t be intimidated or bullied as we continue to represent the interests of conservatives and all Americans. Heritage supports empowering consumers rather than government. We are, and have always been, champions of the free market and critics of government intervention.” — Rob Bluey, vice president of communications, Heritage Foundation
The problem is Heritage hasn’t always been “champions of the free market and critics of government intervention” as Bluey claims.
In 1989 when universal health care was neither established nor inevitable, Heritage unveiled its plan for comprehensive legislation to provide universal “quality, affordable health care” in the book A National Health System for America by Stuart Butler and Edmund Haislmaier.
Heritage’s individual mandate was “not a mandate on employers, but a mandate on heads of households.”
“[T]he Heritage mandate was indistinguishable in principle from the ObamaCare one. In both cases, the federal government would force individuals to purchase a product from a private company.” — Avik Roy,
Again in October 2015, Jim DeMint, who headed Heritage at the time, and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich pressured Freedom Caucus members to endorse Paul Ryan for House Speaker.
In a closed-door meeting with the House Freedom Caucus, DeMint and Gingrich convinced some members to rethink making Ryan Speaker, whom they saw as a tool of John Boehner, the Speaker they had just ousted.
“Promises were made … as I understand it … I was really surprised that the head of the Heritage Foundation, Jim DeMint was making calls telling conservatives to back off their conservatism and back the guy for Speaker that doesn’t just have a D, he has an F under the Conservative Review analysis.” — Louis Gohmert, Republican Congressman, Texas
According to Carlson, the duplicitous conservative nonprofits’ system has been in place for decades, which could explain “why, no matter how much money you send, nothing gets more conservative.”
Sources cited in this story include: Tucker Carlson: Heritage Foundation, Other Koch-Funded Groups Carrying Water For Big Tech’s Left-Wing Agenda, Google and the Koch Network: A Troubling Alliance of Convenience, Google Transparency Project Releases Database of 3,000 Grants Awarded to Academic Researchers by Google, Heritage Foundation Responds to Tucker Carlson’s False Accusations on Big Tech, and How the Heritage Foundation, a Conservative Think Tank, Promoted the Individual Mandate.
THE MILLSTONE DIARIES 