As Decrypt reports, the now-independent talking head told attendees of a private Trump-supporting event surrounding the Bitcoin 2024 conference this past week that it was "obvious" that the CIA created the titular cryptocurrency.
"Obviously it was the CIA, we all know that," Carlson told the Nashville crowd, chuckling. "It’s like Signal, they got there first. It’s a honeytrap!"
While the intelligence community does indeed have documented connections to the founding of Signal, the popular encrypted messaging app championed by both Elon Musk and Edward Snowden, the same can't be said of Bitcoin. It appears that in conflating the two, Carlson is suggesting that government interest in coopting burgeoning tech is the same thing as creating that tech.
Tucker says the CIA invented Bitcoin
What is more likely, some secret guy with a Japanese name or a powerful government built it? pic.twitter.com/6jn6e3MfVv
— Jake Shields (@jakeshieldsajj) July 31, 2024
Who is She?
Adding fuel to the longstanding conspiratorial claim is the fact that nobody actually knows the identity of Bitcoin's purported founder Satoshi Nakamoto, though over the years various people have taken credit and offered half-baked theories.
"Crypto people aren't just in it to make a buck, they're in it to change the world," Carlson equivocated. "These are not shallow people. These are people who can answer every single question except for 'who was Satoshi?' Someone should answer that!"
Ultimately, the ex-Fox host said that it doesn't matter to him if the feds were behind the world's most valuable and well-known cryptocurrency.
"I don't care if it was the CIA," he said. "It doesn't matter. The idea is still a great idea."
It's far from the worst thing Carlson has ever been recorded saying, but it's nevertheless a goofy reminder that these are the kinds of people who have been considered kingmakers in conservative circles — and this is certainly not the most outlandish thing he believes, either.