Tucker Carlson’s Twitter show drew a non-trivial amount of eyeballs when it debuted in June, but viewership numbers have been dwindling since then. Still, he presses on, and on his latest episode shared yesterday (July 26), he was joined by Ice Cube, and the pair spent about a quarter of the 12-minute episode talking about the COVID-19 vaccine, specifically about why the rapper didn’t get it.
Carlson asked why Ice didn’t take the vaccine, noting he had “a direct order” to do so, and the rapper responded, “Yeah, I’m not real good with direct orders. […] No, it wasn’t ready. You know, it was six-month kind of rush job and I didn’t feel safe.”
Ice Cube explains Why He Didn’t Get Jabbed.
“There’s no repercussions if they’re wrong. But I get all the repercussions if they’re wrong.” pic.twitter.com/YrxB4jxySH
— David Vance (@DVATW) July 26, 2023
Carlson jumped in, “But they told you you were safe,” and Ice responded, “I know what they said [laughs]. I know what they said, and I heard them. I heard them loud and clear, but it’s not their decision. There’s no repercussions if they’re wrong, but I can get all the repercussions if they’re wrong.”
The host then asked if it was a tough choice for Ice to make and he said, “No, it wasn’t a tough call. I wanted to be an example for my kids, really make sure they wouldn’t take it either, show them that I want to stand on my convictions and that I was willing to lose $9 million and more because we’ve probably lost more since then.”
The part about losing $9 million refers to what he said in a 2022 interview: “I turned down a movie because I didn’t want to get the motherf*cking jab. I turned down $9 million. I didn’t want get the jab. F*ck that jab. F*ck ya’ll for trying to make me get it. I don’t know how Hollywood feels about me right now.”
Elsewhere in the Carlson conversation, Ice noted he never intended for his vaccination status to be a matter of public concern, saying, “I never told anyone not to get vaccinated publicly. That was never my message to the world. I didn’t even want people to know whether I got vaccinated or not. I was pretty upset that that even came out, because I was just gonna quietly, you know, just not take it and deal with the consequences as they came.”
Carlson, for the record, proudly proclaimed he didn’t get the vaccine either: When Ice asked if he got the jab, the host exclaimed, “Of course not!”
Find the full episode of Carlson’s show here.