Tucker Carlson: Experts are demanding you accept responsibility for these natural disasters

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Tucker Carlson: Experts are demanding you accept responsibility for these natural disasters

Fox News host Tucker Carlson weighs in on the devastation caused by Hurricane Ian and calls out liberals and lawmakers for blaming climate change on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.'

This is a rush transcript of "Tucker Carlson Tonight" on September 29, 2022. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: This is a FOX News Alert: Search and rescue operations are underway this hour throughout the State of Florida. Hurricane Ian, as you know struck the southwestern part of that state yesterday as a Category 4 storm and caused catastrophic damage. Roughly three million Floridians no longer have power. Many of them don't have communications.

Entire communities were flattened. There is no official count as of right now, but it is clear this could be the deadliest storm in Florida's history.

Let's go now to FOX's Steve Harrigan, who is in Placida, Florida in Charlotte County in the southwestern part of the state.

STEVE HARRIGAN, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: So, Claudia, what are you doing now?

CLAUDIA, RESIDENT: I'm getting important stuff, my paperwork, my husband's personal things, because I lost him two months ago and now, I've lost my only home. So, I am packing it up and taking it to my car.

HARRIGAN: You're packing it up in the garbage can?

CLAUDIA: Yes.

HARRIGAN: Have you gotten any help yet?

CLAUDIA: No. But that's okay. I'm strong. I can get it. I can get the important things.

HARRIGAN: Thanks, Claudia. God bless you.

CLAUDIA: Thank you.

HARRIGAN: All right.

CLAUDIA: I'll be alright.

HARRIGAN: Yes, you'll be all right. So Claudia says she's strong and that's what people are relying on, at least in these first early hours here, their own strength. Some people have been asking us for water, food and of course, communication is a tough thing as well with all the cell phones down.

Right now really, its neighbor helping each other here until help from more than 35 States does arrive.

Tucker, back to you.

CARLSON: Our Steve Harrigan in Placida, Florida.

We're going to assess the path of the storm and the damage that it's wrought with hurricane expert, Bryan Norcross, who joins us now for the third night in a row.

Bryan, good to see you. Tell us the status of the storm now, if you would.

BRYAN NORCROSS, FOX WEATHER HURRICANE SPECIALIST: Thank you.

Well, the storm is gathering strength. Again, this is going to be a big rainstorm and a flood event for South Carolina, then on up into the Piedmont in the mountains of North Carolina, and Virginia. So, there's much more of this storm to come. Phases three and four, so to speak, as the floodwaters are just going down in North Florida. So that's phase two.

And then we get down to the original disaster and the biggest part of this disaster, which is in southwest Florida. This was the storm at landfall. And what happens with storms is it depends on both the strength of the storm and the direction of the wind on who gets the tremendous storm surge, which of course does all that damage to the coast.

So, when we look at this map, the white areas here, those are the winds of over a hundred miles an hour, and then the yellow area out here is winds from 60 to 100 miles per hour. So, what we see that's the wind speeds and then we see the wind direction. And if you notice the wind direction at landfall at three o'clock in the afternoon, that was right into the Naples area.

So, the flooding in Naples came first because they happen to have the direction of those strong winds that were pushing the Gulf water in for downtown. Now looking close up here, here is Fort Myers, it is actually well up the Caloosahatchee River, and so just beginning to push water up the Caloosahatchee, when the center of the storm over here went up that way, that changed the orientation of the winds and that push more water up the Caloosahatchee and the water up there couldn't get out and then more came and more came and more came, so it took longer to flood in Fort Myers.

Looking farther south down here, you can see that those hundred mile an hour winds were pushing water into Fort Myers Beach all the way over the Barrier Island there and that's why that place is just devastated. It's going to take a long time before that's actually a workable community again.

Here on Sanibel, you get water from a bunch of different directions and this is where the Sanibel causeway here was knocked out, so there is just a lot going on here, and then just to the north, Gasparilla, we've got water coming the other way. All the areas around that eye, Tucker, took this ultra-hard hit from this Category 4 Hurricane.

CARLSON: Bryan Norcross, thanks so much.

There is a fire in the picture from Sanibel there of course, that's a feature always of storms like this, fires breakout and some of the damage through the pictures you have seen is from burning, not from flooding. Interesting.

We're going to have more reporting all night from the State of Florida, including on this show.

But first a step back, so when something this awful happens, something that affects the lives of millions of your fellow Americans, decent people step back for a moment. It's a moment that demands reverence and silence to consider what we've just seen and then the practical questions.

People are suffering. How are they suffering? They don't have power. They don't have communications. How many homes were destroyed?

You ask questions like that, and you try to assess what this means and the human cost of it. The one thing you don't do is immediately jump forward to score some sort of cheap and sleazy political point from it. That used to be obvious.

But for the past several years, it's been clear it's no longer obvious, at least to one political party. You saw this happen after the forest fires in California two years ago. It happened after tornadoes killed people in Midwest last year, and it's happening again now.

Immediately on cable television and on the floor of the legislative bodies across this country, self-described experts are demanding that you accept responsibility for whatever natural disaster that has just occurred. It's your fault, including for Hurricane Ian. You did this because you didn't support giving Joe Biden trillions of dollars to fight climate change. So, you caused it. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM SATER, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Decades ago, it used to be one or two a season, it would happen. Now, with climate change and these extreme warm waters, it's almost, you know, it's happening all the time.

MSNBC REPORTS: This storm, in a way, is kind of bad news for the people that are still trying to deny climate change as a factor.

STEPHANIE RUHLE, MSNBC, "THE 11TH HOUR": Florida Republicans deny climate change as a monster storm barrels towards the coast.

BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: This will be a first-time test for how you adapt to these new stronger storms on a warmer planet as a result of climate change.

CHRIS HAYES, "ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES," MSNBC: The threat exacerbated, of course, by climate change.

ALI VELSHI, MSNBC HOST: Charleston, like Miami, gets water that comes up on a good sunny day. That's climate change because water levels are rising.

JOY REID, "THE REID OUT," MSNBC: Our Earth is getting warmer and there is just no doubt, I think, left that it is feeding these beasts.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Imagine taking a science lecture from someone as stupid as Stephanie Ruhle or Ali Velshi. So, on that level, it's ridiculous and it's also, as we just suggested, unseemly and anti-human. Of course, people are dying, so wait just a moment before putting forward your demands for more political power.

But it's also factually untrue. So, you just heard one hare hat say, "It used to be one or two hurricanes a season it would happen. Now, it's happening all the time," and you hear this all the time, and it's a way of terrifying you into handing politicians more power over your life, but the fact is, it's a lie. It's not even remotely true. I mean, it's not a close call.

There has been, as a factual matter, no increase in hurricane frequency in the continental United States from 1900 to 2020. So, that's 120 years. It's been recorded. We have the data. They're on your screen right now.

In fact, as Michael Shellenberger has pointed out, someone who has actually looked at the numbers, the number of landfalling hurricanes has dropped slightly over the past century. Why? We're not sure, but we can probably guess it has nothing to do with climate or your SUV.

We do know that in that same period, deaths of human beings from natural disasters such as hurricanes have dropped a lot by about 90 percent, and the death toll is forecast to drop even more as people respond to the changing environment. That's what people do.

Government scientists at the NOAA, even the professional alarmists at the IPCC, predict that hurricanes will become 25 percent less frequent throughout the 21st Century. Oh, and that makes sense because the current Atlantic hurricane season is the slowest one in a quarter-century.

So, none of that is to downplay or minimize in any way the savagery of Hurricane Ian or the sadness of what it's done to your fellow Americans. It's horrible, but it does raise the question, how exactly are you responsible for it?

Well, of course, you're not in any sense. You're not liable for that. You didn't do that. You're a normal person. You're grieving for the people who were just killed. You're not trying to score political points on their deaths.

But Don Lemon steps into the breach, the breach between fact and rhetoric with a brand-new theory. Don Lemon claims that storms may not have become more frequent, but they definitely become more "intense." Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: The science shows what the science shows. It's undeniable what is happening.

But listen, let's talk about the storm surge. Really, what I was trying to explain, this is just the phenomenon of the intensifying storms over the years, what it is. Not trying to say, it's one that, you know, one particular storm, we could gauge something.

But listen, you get an idea. You've been doing this for a while. I've been covering this for, you know, since I've been in the business for 20 years, have lived in the Gulf Coast. You see the intensity of the storms increasing and that's -- the science definitely shows that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So the intensity of the storms is increased and notice how, like all TV presenters, the claim is never proven. They never show you how it's true. They just assert it.

"They become more intense." Well, how does Don Lemon know that? Because of a longitudinal study, he's done? Well yes, in a way he, "lived in the Gulf Coast." So, he knows the storms are getting more intense because he has been in this business a long time.

Well, is that true? It's worth assessing it since we hear it constantly and there's a political reason they're telling you that. Is it true? Are the storms getting more intense? And if so, how much more intense are they getting?

Well, we did our level best since this is a news show to get to the bottom of that. According to the latest models from the NOAA, the worst-case scenario is that hurricanes get five percent stronger this century. We're 22 years into the century, 78 years to go.

So, hurricanes are 25 percent less common and at most five percent more intense. Do the math. Well, as scientist, Roger Pielke put it, "Even under the most extreme scenarios of climate change, future disasters will look a lot like today's."

So, it's not really about science, is it? Because actually there's no science behind these claims. No, it's what everything is in this intensely politicized country. It's another opportunity to punish people who don't vote the right way, to cow them into submission, to seize the moral high ground, to punish your opponents.

That's why even as bodies are still being identified, and apparently many have not been in the streets of Florida, "The View," which apparently is still on the air, mocked the people of Florida for daring to ask disaster relief money from the Federal government. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WHOOPI GOLDBERG, HOST, "THE VIEW": Governor DeSantis says it's all hands on deck to prepare for what's coming and that includes reaching across the aisle for help.

JOY BEHAR, HOST, "THE VIEW": Isn't it socialism when the government helps you?

SUNNY HOSTIN, HOST, "THE VIEW": That's what they say, like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid and things like that.

GOLDBERG: Yes.

BEHAR: And the police and I mean, socialism --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Oh, so clever, oh, what an incisive point. This show is totally opposed to censorship or de-platforming or pulling anyone off the air. We're certainly not calling for that in the case of "The View," but just as an objective matter, when that show finally does die, a well-deserved death and is gone and forgotten, this will be a slightly better country. That's just true.

So, consider what you just saw. A hurricane devastates Florida, kills Americans, and the reaction of the morons on "The View" is to laugh at them, to mock the people who are suffering and while they're doing this, they claim it's really coming from a place of compassion. They're laughing at people who are dying because they're better than you. See how that works? Here's Joy Reid.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REID: It's a bit ironic now that you might have Floridians having to actually pour over the borders and go north and get out of the State of Florida in the exact same crisis that we've been talking about on a trolling level in that State for a long time.

And be careful about attacking people who have to move to save their own lives and safety, because you never know when it's your people that have to move, when it's your people who have to migrate, when it's your people who have to get on that road.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So, we throw on a lot of cable news clips on the air and on one level it's like, who cares what the dummies on cable television say, but it's kind of a window into a broader political debate. If you wind up in a country where no one can think clearly, when the most educated Harvard graduates like Joy Reid, literally, can't think in a logical, linear way, they're incapable of rational thought, then over time, your whole country becomes incapable of rational thought. People just fall out of the habit of thinking like adults, and we're moving toward there.

So, these are the very same people, by the way, who cheered as illegal aliens were removed by force from Martha's Vineyard and sent to a military base. They called them trash. They took them out within 48 hours with the Army. But now they're lecturing you about compassion as they gloat over a deadly hurricane.

It's time to stop taking them seriously. Of course, they're not compassionate. They don't care about other people. What they care about is advancing the political power of the party they belong to and if you need more evidence of that, Joy Reid went on to explain that the hurricane, the one we just saw, is not a moment to stop and reflect on the fragility of life. No, it's another reason to keep our border open. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REID: The reality is that humans, we are literally running from what the climate -- from the climate change that we're pretending isn't happening, but we're physically being moved around the Earth because of it.

ALI VELSHI: It will actually be the single biggest cause of migration. We typically think of migration being caused by conflict and wars and things like that in Syria; it's reverted in Ukraine. That's not going to be what it is. It's actually going to be migration because people can't move.

Generally speaking, prosperous people can move first because they can afford to, but eventually, when the grain stops growing or the fields keep flooding, the poor people move, too and we're going to have to come to terms with the fact that that's going to be the major cause of migration around the world and here in America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Imagine when these people go home at night and look in the mirror. Oh, another day of successfully pretending not to be stupid. Another day of fooling TV viewers into thinking we know what we're talking about, but nobody's fooled. Anyone knows anything, anyone knows any commonsense at all or just the powers of observation that most adults have would know that what they're saying is ridiculous.

Ian wasn't the first hurricane in Florida. Florida gets hurricanes every year and more Americans have moved to Florida in the past two years than any other State so actually, climate is not forcing people out of Florida. They're somehow moving there. It's one of our hottest States. How does that work exactly? They never answer.

Instead, they tell you the solution to climate change is to keep our southern border open. Martha's Vineyard is still off limits, of course, because that's where their donors live.

What's so interesting, even as they make the case that the United States deserves to keep its borders open, we deserve the punishment that we receive from mass migration because we cause climate change, that's the argument they're making, this is atonement for a climate sins, these same people never tell China to open its borders, even though China is by far the largest carbon emitter and the largest polluter in conventional terms in the world.

But no one is ever in China's face about being an ethno-state, or racist, not letting non-Han Chinese into the country, which they don't.

They have no moral obligation to let Burkina Faso move to Beijing. Why is that exactly?

In fact, leaders of the Democratic Party defended China. They defend China. The same people who tell you that climate change is the most important issue in the world, China, of course, the main driver of climate change, by their definition, carbon emissions. Those same people tell you that China is doing a great job, and we're sinning. Here's our climate czar, the cadaverous John Kerry.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MSNBC QUESTION: My question to you is what can be done about changing their seeming reluctance to participate in affairs of climate control with other nations.

JOHN KERRY, US CLIMATE ENVOY: Well, China might, China, interestingly enough, China has a plan. They put a plan in place. We think they could be doing more, but China is going to be building more electric vehicles, will be put on the road over the next year or so in China than in all the rest of the world put together.

They are deploying renewable power at a rate that exceeds all other nations. They are the largest manufacturer of renewables in the world and so China is moving.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So, John Kerry -- who really is cadaverous, it felt mean to say that, but actually look at the tape, it's pretty accurate -- John Kerry is basically doing an infomercial for the Communist Party of China. This is the climate czar.

This is the country that's built more coal plants in the past five years, than any place in the world by far, 10X, and he is not only sniffing their throne, he is defending them on climate grounds.

It's not subtle. They're not even trying.

They don't care about climate change. They definitely don't care about natural disasters. They just want power, and that's why they suck up to the most powerful guy in the room and that would be Xi, Chairman Xi. Yes. It's unbelievable.

How deep is their insincerity? Well, last year during hurricane season, Joe Biden leveraged these natural disasters as a way to sell his vaccines. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: God forbid a natural disaster strikes, we have to make sure we're ready to be protected against COVID-19 as well.

Let me be clear, if you're in a state where hurricanes often strike like Florida or the Gulf Coast or into Texas, a vital part of preparing for hurricane season is to get vaccinated now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Sure, the lesson the hurricane is in tornadoes and tidal waves and earthquakes is to get the vaccine. Can we just have a natural disaster that we accept as natural? That's why they are called natural disasters, because we didn't cause them. They're products of nature. God's in charge. We're not God.

But you really have to think you're not God in order to admit that, and they think they are God. They think they're in charge of the weather and that's why they just can't give it a break. They just can't let people die, and their deaths be observed for what they are, which is a tragedy that demands reverence, not posturing, none of their stupid political speech, but they can't control themselves, ever.

Candace Owens is a keen observer of all this. She hosts a great podcast. She joins us tonight with reaction.

Candace Owens, I would love to see someone die in this country without getting a lecture posthumously, "Oh, you've died of smoking." "You died because you didn't get the vax." "You died because you drive an SUV."

Can we just acknowledged death as a sad thing, give it the reverence it deserves and move on?

CANDACE OWENS, POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well not if you're a member of the Democratic Party because they are utter sociopaths and psychopaths and when they see these tragedies take place, by the way this is the same methodology that takes place with school shootings.

CARLSON: Exactly.

OWENS: You would think that we could mourn and we can be said, but what they say is, "Wait a second. There are some children that are dead, so allow us to get in front of cameras and tell you why you need to give us more power."

And the fact that they think about their own power and consuming more power when tragedy strikes, is, as I said, an example of their -- that they are utter psychopaths.

And what's going on, obviously, is an extreme tragedy. But as you pointed out, Tucker, it is a natural tragedy. The Earth has hurricanes. If there was no human beings that walk the face of the planet, there would continue to be hurricanes, like there will continue to be blizzards and like there will continue to be tornadoes.

There is no lobby, in my opinion, that should be laughed at hard than the climate lobby, because they just keep being proven wrong.

Now, when I was a kid, I was told it was global warming. Hide under your desk, kids, the polar bears are going to drown because there's global warming. But they stopped using that language around 2011. Because accidentally, the earth started to cool and disprove their narrative.

Before my generation, by the way, Tucker, there was generation that was told global cooling was going to spell the end of the world except what happened was they were proven wrong and the earth started to warm.

Yes, right? There was the ozone layer. Remember the ozone layer. The hole in the ozone layer? Oops, that actually wasn't a tragedy and so they moved on.

There was the acidic oceans. There was going to be acidic rain because the oceans were acid. Oops, that didn't happen. So they moved on.

They've been wrong over and over and over again. Their climate models are a complete fraud, and yet they are still allowed to look you in the face when a natural disaster strikes and tell you well, you know, I know we've been wrong for everyone. We've never once gotten it right. But give us your money anyways.

These people are sick.

CARLSON: Well, I completely agree with that. And in general, people's kooky theories don't bother me. You can be a flat earther, a circumcision activists, well, you can be whatever you want to be. But if you try to take over my power grid on the basis of your ridiculous theories, then I think we have a right to fight back. No?

OWENS: We absolutely have a right to fight back and where we need to start is in the education system because my mind was polluted about climate change or about global warming, rather, because they sat us down in health class and they made us watch "Inconvenient Truth" by Al Gore. That was a lie. It never came into fruition and they keep focusing on these young generations to sell them fear for their own power.

CARLSON: You're totally -- man, no one can sum it up more crisply than you.

Candace Owens, thank you.

OWENS: Thank you.

CARLSON: To lie for their own power.

So back to reality, physical reality, the earth, Hurricane Ian, still moving, moving northeast after leaving a swath of destruction across the State of Florida.

Fort Myers, Florida, one of the hardest hit places, we've got to report live from there straight ahead.

Right now, you're seeing video from storm chaser, Brandon Ivey. He is in Port Charlotte right near Placida where we were before. We've got a lot of his footage to show you tonight.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: This is a FOX News Alert: Matlacha is a small island near Cape Coral in Florida;. It took a direct hit from Hurricane Ian. It is now totally cut off from the mainland. Bridges and houses have been destroyed. FOX Weather's Will Nunley made it onto Matlacha after the storm and filed this report for us.

WILL NUNLEY, FOX WEATHER: Tucker, we arrived here at Matlacha Islands, the southernmost point of Cape Coral to find a coastline that has been shredded under the force of this storm. Homes that look like this, neighborhood after neighborhood washed away, washed from their foundations.

I spoke to the man who owns this home. He wasn't here as a storm approached. He said he made the decision to get out at those last minute forecast getting stronger. He knows he wouldn't have survived a storm like that.

He says neighbors here for years have been talking about the storm, the big one there was going to cause damage like that. And sure enough, it has come to pass.

Let me show you this area right here where you see water, this all used to be a lot, a sand lot that they were just about to build a new home on. A seawall is there in the distance. They just had that seawall built, it did not do enough to hold everything together, certainly under the force of this storm.

This is another thing that we're running into as we get close to these Barrier Islands. The roads have been washed out. So right now, you have emergency rescue crews that are trying to get to places like Pine Island, and they're having to go by helicopter, get on the boat to try and reach people that by the way are still stranded.

So this search and rescue mission is still very, very active. There are people who are on these Barrier Islands that are awaiting rescue.

So much still to track there for you in terms of those rescues underway. It's difficult to navigate around here. It took us a couple of hours actually to get to this point from Fort Myers because all the electricity is out, so therefore your street lights don't work. Traffic is a little bit of mayhem. There is no gasoline. Hotel rooms are still extremely scarce at this point.

So, these are delicate first few hours of the search and rescue process and unfortunately what we're seeing is not good.

Stay with FOX Weather. We'll continue to keep you posted on what we find.

Tucker, back to you.

CARLSON: Will Nunley for us at Matlacha. We're going to have more from Florida in just a moment. Last night, we told you that the FBI's persistent crackdown on civil liberties in this country and it seems to be intensifying. Dozens of agencies raided the home of a pro-life community leader, arrested him in front of his wife and seven children with guns drawn, for nothing, for a non-crime, a misdemeanor.

We didn't used to have FBI raids on the basis of alleged misdemeanors in this country, now we do if you vote the wrong way.

But at the same time, the FBI is all but ignoring violence committed against people who don't vote for Joe Biden. In June, criminals firebombed a pro-life pregnancy center in Buffalo, a place called CompassCare Pregnancy Services. People who did this, the bombers have not been caught. Why? Because the FBI has not even bothered to investigate a firebombing.

Now local police and the Feds took surveillance footage from the center, but they didn't do anything with it, but they didn't give it back to the center. The center is suing to get it back. Then the attorney for the local police told the Crisis Pregnancy Center, they can't have their own tapes back because those tapes might inspire right-wing violence.

Are you following the logic here? It's completely insane. It's utterly politicized law enforcement. It's the deepest level of corruption. It's totally unacceptable. You can't have a country run like this.

The Reverend James Harden is the President and CEO of CompassCare Pregnancy Services and we're grateful he is joining us tonight. Reverend Harden, thanks so much for joining us.

It's hard -- this is one of those stories, you sum up the facts and it's hard to believe they're real. Did we sum that up correctly? Is that actually what's happened?

REVEREND JAMES HARDEN, PRESIDENT AND CEO, COMPASSCARE PREGNANCY SERVICES: I know it sounds dystopian, but that's exactly what's happening.

Yes. I mean, we're facing essentially a moral hurricane in our country. The FBI has gone from abdicating their duty to provide equal justice under the law to pro-life people like us, to downright attacking us. And that was our concern when we filed suit against the Amherst Police Department taking charge of the investigation to get our video back so we can start to prosecute whoever the perpetrators are.

We came out and I was concerned that they would engage in character assassination, that is the FBI. That would be their next step. Over 70 attacks on prolife organizations across the country, zero arrests.

I mean, look, it's naive to think that the largest law enforcement agency on the globe with the best forensic technology known to man doesn't know not a single person who is engaging in these attacks. If it's not the FBI doing it, they certainly know who is and they're choosing not to make arrests and we need equal protection under the law.

Look, Jane's Revenge is the abortion terrorist group, the pro-abortion terrorist group that has taken responsibility for these attacks and they are getting a pass -- a pass. And I say, look, Jane's Revenge is the Democratic Party's new KKK and the new cross in the front yard is burning down pregnancy centers.

But instead of denigrating the personhood of Black people, they're denigrating the personhood of preborn boys and girls and anybody that seeks to stand up for them.

CARLSON: You can't allow fire bombings in your country, period. I mean, Congress has shut the FBI down over -- and really quick, were you really told that you could not have your own surveillance tapes back because those tapes of a firebombing of your property might inspire right-wing terrorism? It doesn't seem real.

HARDEN: Yes. Oh, yes. We're in the process of suing. I mean, there are litigations -- active litigation happening right now to get our video back and so we can even -- so we can just see it.

In fact, the town attorney representing the police department went so far as to say that to characterize pro-life people supporting us as AK-47 gun toting people going around bombing and killing people. They're vilifying us.

CARLSON: Man, I grew up in this country. I'm trying not to be hysterical or alarmist. You don't want to make something sound worse than it is, but the facts alone in this story are really stunning to the conscience. They really are.

Reverend James Harden joining us tonight. Thank you.

HARDEN: Thank you.

CARLSON: So, if you make under like maybe 200 grand a year, most people definitely do in this country, you'll notice that food costs have gone out of control. Now, why is this happening? Well, the Democratic Party is blaming greedy food corporations and Vladimir Putin. Is that really what's going on? We're about to talk to the CEO of one of the biggest food brands in the United States to get a little clarity on that question.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHRISTINA COLEMAN, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Welcome to "FOX News Live." I'm Christina Coleman in Los Angeles.

Ian regaining hurricane strength as it heads for South Carolina. It is expected to make landfall in Charleston tomorrow, a region vulnerable to storm surge. This massive storm already causing widespread destruction in Florida after crashing ashore yesterday as a Category 4 Storm.

Severe flooding forced the rescues of hundreds of people today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. RON DESANTIS (R-FL): As soon as the winds died down enough to where it was safe, you had Coast Guard assets, you had urban search and rescue teams, we've had the National Guard out assisting people. There have been more than 700 confirmed rescues and there's likely many more than that that will be confirmed as more data comes in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLEMAN: The hurricane is also blamed for several deaths, but an exact number remains unknown. Also millions of people are now without power and clean drinking water.

I'm Christina Coleman. Now back to TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT.

CARLSON: This is a FOX News Alert: Hurricane Ian absolutely crushed Naples, Florida, one of the fastest growing cities in the country. One of the nicest.

Naples recorded more than eight feet of storm surge -- eight feet. That's a record. Cars and debris are piled up in the streets.

FOX Weather's Max Gorden has assessed the damage for us in Naples.

MAX GORDEN, FOX WEATHER: Water still fills the streets here in Naples, Florida and after a massive storm surge inundated the city as Hurricane Ian came to shore. You can see this roadway still filled with water and behind me right here, folks cleaning up the damage, lots of palm fronds, other debris from the storm. Streets are blocked off here.

And as you can see, the winds were really whipping. You can look and see this palm tree just stripped from the winds.

We've got a vehicle driving up here, really almost up to the bumper there. You can see how high the water is and you can see how high this storm surge came.

If you come over here, you can look at the line of debris on this house. Really, houses filled with water. It looks like between two to three feet of water in some cases, going to be a lot of work mucking these homes out.

CARLSON: Food prices, if you've been in the grocery store, you know are continuing to climb. Political leaders like Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren, say it's got nothing to do with the war in Europe or ESG or anything they did. It has to do with greedy grocers who are getting rich.

Well, we almost never speak to the heads of big companies on the show because they won't come on. But Bob Unanue is the CEO of Goya Foods, one of the biggest food brands in the country and we are grateful that he has been willing to join us tonight.

Bob, thanks so much for coming on tonight. So, you have heard you run this huge company and you have heard that you're the reason that food prices are up. Is that true?

BOB UNANUE, CEO, GOYA FOODS: Not true, Tucker, and thank you for your courage and speaking the truth. And I'd like to say our hearts, our prayers and our help -- because we are in Puerto Rico and Florida -- go out to the victims of Fiona.

CARLSON: Yes.

UNANUE: At the core of inflation, and it's out of control, especially in food is evil. A desire to control us.

When I was a child, my parents said, never take candy from a stranger and they're giving out candy, incentivizing people not to work. They're taking away our purpose, our spirit, our reason to get up every day and they are doing it with their own candy. They're taking our candy and using disincentivize us not to work. That is very inflationary.

CARLSON: I think you're the only person I've heard say that, that this is an intentional effort to take people's purpose for living away, which is work, the act of creation, that's why we're alive. Why does nobody say that?

UNANUE: Well, you know, we were an essential business, Tucker. We never stopped working. But work is essential. It gives us our reason.

You know God -- I love this, gal from -- Meloni from Italy. You know, she has this fascist speak, "God, Family, Country." And you know, you need to have a purpose. She says we all have our genetic code. Each one of us is made in the likeness of God with our own identity.

So we all have a purpose. Now you take that purpose away by the very few who want to own us, enslave us, control us for their own greed and power.

CARLSON: Okay, I don't think I've ever heard a CEO of a big company talk that way and I hope you won't mind if we bother you to come down and see you for a much longer interview.

Bob Unanue of Goya, which I'm going to start eating tonight. I appreciate your coming on today. That's amazing. Thank you.

UNANUE: God bless you, Tucker.

CARLSON: God bless you.

Bob Unanue of Goya.

So, it turns out you're not allowed to ask questions about what happened to the Nord Stream pipelines because obviously Putin blew up his own pipeline. That makes sense, right? Right. More on that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: This is a FOX News Alert: So far, no big population inside the United States has been hit harder by Hurricane Ian than Fort Myers, Florida which essentially got hit right in the face. Power is out, the piers are destroyed. The storm surge was overwhelming.

FOX Weather's Robert Ray assess d the damage at a marina in Fort Myers.

ROBERT WRAY, FOX WEATHER: Tucker, it seems like this that just take your eyes and your senses away here.

Look at this destruction. I'm standing on concrete slabs that were once piers, cuts by the wind and the energy of Hurricane Ian and the storm surge that came in. Look at these vessels, Tucker, if you can, piled them up like Tinker Toys, snapped on their sides, some of them are crashing into the land here, one-vessel so large all of this as if it were nothing. That's what Hurricane Ian did to this area with those hurricane force winds.

And downtown Fort Myers took the storm surge. Many of the businesses in the historic area in the streets look like rushing rivers as the storm came in in the evening. Some of the toughest conditions were Wednesday night as the dirty side of the hurricane rolled through and made landfall about 20 miles to the north of here, Tucker, and the situation was just absolutely nasty.

As we tried to leave this downtown area last night and the surge coming in. What we experienced was road conditions with power lines down, trees down, and having to zigzag our way through.

There is no power still here, no running water, and on the coastline, search and rescues occurring as we speak right now. Those areas devastated.

Some of the images out of Fort Myers Beach, complete disaster. Hurricane Ian, unfortunately, will go down in the books will likely be retired and it is not done charging up the coast chart creating bad situations for not only the rest of the Peninsula, but Georgia and the Carolinas -- Tucker.

CARLSON: Look at those pictures. Thanks for that.

So the Nord Stream pipelines blew up recently. It was sabotaged. The biggest act of industrial terrorism, maybe ever. We know probably who didn't do it. Whatever you think of him, Vladimir Putin, he may be evil, but he's not stupid. Those were his pipelines. Russia paid for them.

And critically, they gave Russia leverage over the rest of the world in the middle of a war. Those pipelines are what they plan to use to sell gas to Europe. So, why would Putin blow up his own most important assets? So, who did this? Well, we don't know.

We do know just a few months ago that Joe Biden promised to "bring an end" to those pipelines.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: If Russia invades that means, tanks or troops crossing the border of Ukraine. Again then, there will be -- there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.

REPORTER: But how will you -- how will you do that exactly since the project and control of the project is within Germany's control?

BIDEN; We will -- I promise you, we will be able to do it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: There will no longer be a Nord Stream 2.

Okay, so when this week, there no longer was a Nord Stream 2, someone blew it up, a Polish lawmaker who is married to Anne Applebaum of "The Atlantic" and close friends of Joe Biden tweeted this: "Thank you, USA." He has since deleted that tweet. I wonder why.

So based on the evidence, the likely suspect is not Vladimir Putin. Obviously, blame Putin for whatever you want, but he clearly didn't do this. I mean, right?

Well, not if you're the US media. You're insane if you suggest that. "The Daily Mail," which we love, but they just ran this headline, "What Putin could gain from blowing up the Nord Stream gas pipeline." What? The article noted that: "Conspiracy theories abound." The conspiracy theory being if you suspect that maybe Putin didn't do it, you're crazy.

But in reality, Putin blew up his own pipeline "As part of a terrifying new attempt to intimidate the West." What? By destroying his own country. This is insane. It is idiotic.

Now again, we can't say who did it. We're pretty sure who didn't do it and telling us otherwise is just too insulting, actually.

Save it for dumb people. Please.

Well, we hate to go back to go back to the Karmela Harris well, but you just can't help yourself. She said something else today that's just pretty unbelievable. We've got to show it to you, and we will, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: So Karmela Harris is on a world tour. She stopped by the DMZ, the line that separates North and South Korea today and while there she made a pretty amazing announcement. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: So the United States shares a very important relationship which is an alliance with the Republic of North Korea and it is an alliance that is strong and enduring.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So, Karmela Harris has spent her whole life making alliances with powerful men. That would be Montel Williams and Willie Brown. We had no idea she had an alliance with Kim Jong-un of North Korea, but she just announced it.

And so we went into our files and there it was, a photograph, Karmela Harris, an intimate dinner with Kim Jong-un at the French Laundry. There is the alliance, ladies and gentlemen. Never thought she'd admit it in public, but you know this is a news show, we've got to report what we find.

We are out of time, but we will be back. Have the best night with the ones you love.

Sean Hannity follows.

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