UTAH (ABC4) – After introducing himself using his preferred pronouns in a video that resurfaced recently, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox caught the attention of right-wing Fox News correspondent Tucker Carlson.
“It looks like some stuff happened while I was away this week,” the governor tweeted Saturday night. Gov. Cox was away with his family for spring break.
Cox said, “If you have to doctor a video to make a kind gesture to a nervous kid look bad, that says more about you than me: What did Tucker Carlson get wrong?”
Here’s what happened:
Carlson showed a brief video clip of Cox telling a high school girl that his preferred pronouns are he/him/his.
Harmless, right?
Well, not for Tucker.
“What a creepy guy,” Carlson says, “‘My preferred pronouns are he, him, his,’ Cox tells a room full of children. So, we’ve got that cleared up. Spencer Cox identifies as a male, at least to some limited extent.”
However, the video clip didn’t show what happened just before the Utah governor introduced himself, where a student at the high school he was speaking at introduced herself, saying, “My pronouns are she/her/hers, and I’m in 12th grade at the Tuacahn School for the Arts.”
The gesture of goodwill from Gov. Cox came after the student spoke about poor mental health within the LGBTQ+ community, asking, “What is the state’s plan to get more mental health therapists into each school?”
Cox went on to talk about legislation that adds funding for mental health resources in schools.
Carlson goes on to discuss the video clip, in what he deemed to be some sort of political cowardice, or, an unwillingness to stand up to the “liberal agenda.”
Carlson described Cox and Sen. Romney as “liberal Republicans,” saying that they are betraying the trust of Utah Republican voters. He dubbed Cox a “cut-rate Gavin Newsom imitator.”
Cox responded Saturday by providing an explanation of the context, in which it seemed appropriate to him to provide such pronouns.
Click here to see Gov. Cox’s response.
