Fox News released a brief statement about the departure of the network's top-rated host and biggest star, which read in part: "Fox News media and Tucker Carlson have mutually agreed to part ways."
Tucker Carlson is off the air.
The bombshell news took everyone by surprise on Monday morning, and came with no warning.
Fox News released a brief statement about the departure of the network's top-rated host and biggest star, which read in part: "Fox News media and Tucker Carlson have mutually agreed to part ways."
Carlson gave no hint at what was to come last week, and signed off from his show airing Friday by saying: "We'll be back on Monday - in the meantime have the best weekend."
The news means that the roughly 3.2 million viewers who watch Carlson on weeknights will not get a chance to say their final goodbye.
Mediate reports that this was a firing and that Carlson had no idea it was coming, while the Los Angeles Times quotes sources as saying the decision to fire Carlson came straight from Fox chairman Rupert Murdoch.
News of the controversial right-wing host's firing was cause for celebration for some on Monday, including the women of "The View."
Whoopi Goldberg and Ana Navarro could not contain their glee as all five women — including former White House director of Strategic Communications and assistant to President Trump Alyssa Farrah Griffin — did the wave upon learning the news.
Carlson's loyal viewers are far less enthused, and many took to social media to share how incensed they were while using the hastag #IStandWithTucker.
"Fox News is finished," tweeted one Carlson supporter after learning the news.
The markets did not seem to like the news of Carlson's departure either, as the stock price of Fox News' parent company, Fox Corp, dropped over a point on Monday morning.
The out-of-nowhere exit comes after Fox News agreed to pay three-quarters of a billion dollars in a historic defamation lawsuit after being accused of making false claims about the 2020 election.
"My impression is that this is related to Dominion's lawsuit," Brian Stelter tells Inside Edition. "There are many emails and texts that Dominion was able to obtain that are still redacted. So we don't know what they say. But Fox knows."
The "Morning Show" producer adds: "I think it's possible there are things in those messages that were essentially reason for Fox to get rid of him."
Carlson's ouster is reportedly also connected to a discrimination lawsuit filed by his former producer Abby Grossberg.
"Women were objectified it was a game, it was a sport," Grossberg alleged in an interview after filing her suit. "Female politicians who came on the show were mocked."
On "60 Minutes" last night, retired marine Ray Epps accused Carlson of making his life hell by pushing the false conspiracy theory that he was an FBI operative during the January 6 riots.
Carlson claimed, among other things, that Epps was "on video several times encouraging crimes, riots, breach of the Capitol."
Epps said of Carlson: "He's obsessed with me. He's going to any means possible to destroy my life."
As for Carlson, he has options according to Stelter.
He can do just about whatever he wants," Stelter says. "He can go anywhere in the right-wing media world. He could launch his own network. This is an earthquake for television.":
Carlson has yet to comment on his departure, but the woman who previously occupied his time slot on Fox News did chime in on Monday.
"Good for Tucker," Megyn Kelly wrote in a tweet. "Trust me, he doesn’t need them."
