Several major media organizations have demanded access to the thousands of hours of video recorded inside the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection after House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) gave the footage to Fox News host Tucker Carlson.
The letter, sent to congressional leaders Friday, argues the footage given exclusively to Carlson should be shared with other media groups. Earlier this week, McCarthy gave Carlson 41,000 hours of closed-circuit footage from inside the U.S. Capitol during the attack.
The letter was sent on behalf of ABC, Advance Publications, Axios, CNN, CBS, Gannett, the Los Angeles Times, Politico, ProPublica and Scripps.
Attorney Charles Tobin, representing the outlets, said full public access to the footage is needed to complete the historical record.
“Without full public access to the complete historical record, there is concern that an ideologically-based narrative of an already polarizing event will take hold in the public consciousness, with destabilizing risks to the legitimacy of Congress, the Capitol Police, and the various federal investigations and prosecutions of January 6 crimes,” Tobin wrote in the letter.
Carlson has repeatedly defended rioters who attacked the Capitol and called the hearings on Jan. 6 insurrection “propaganda.”
