Episode 2 of Tucker Carlson’s “Tucker on Twitter” show dropped Thursday just before news of the indictment of Donald Trump broke, and in Episode 3 he brings his reaction to the indictment and, now, arrest.

Like most pundits on the conservative side, Carlson believes Trump’s prosecution is politically motivated, and that it’s been inevitable since February 16, 2016, when Trump loudly and without apology called out the “deep state” by saying:

We should have never been in Iraq. We have destabilized the Middle East. They lied. They said there were weapons of mass destruction. There were none, and they knew there were none. There were no weapons of mass destruction.

As you watch the clip of Trump’s grave offense, watch Jeb! Bush’s face.

Ep. 3 America's principles are at stake pic.twitter.com/eJNSUVvvqY

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) June 13, 2023

Tucker explains:

What just happened was always going to happen. It’s been inevitable since February 16, 2016. That’s the day that Donald Trump made a blood enemy of the largest and most powerful organization in human history, which would be the federal government. Despite what you may remember, it wasn’t anything that Donald Trump said about immigration or trade with China or rapists from Mexico….

[I]nside Washington that was just noise…identity politics doesn’t mean much to permanent Washington. What matters, then and now, is foreign policy, the invasions and occupations and proxy wars; the decisions that determine which global populations will thrive and which will die. The policies that come with trillion-dollar price tags. The ones that, over time, have made the counties around DC the richest suburbs in the world. In Washington, that’s what actually matters.

How do we know? Because unlike domestic policy, when it comes to the types of foreign policy described above:

“Both sides…defend that war relentlessly against all evidence until somebody finally rings the ‘all clear’ bell and they can begin to admit that, ‘Actually maybe it wasn’t such a great idea. We meant well, but it just didn’t work out. The good news is, we’ve learned a lot of important lessons.’ In the end they usually do say something like that…it’s an apology that’s not actually an apology….

But until then, no dissent is allowed. That’s the first rule of Washington. But somehow Trump didn’t bother to follow it. He was from out of town, so maybe he didn’t know it was a rule. Maybe he just didn’t care. Either way, seven and a half years later we can point to the precise moment that Permanent Washington decided to send Donald Trump to prison.

Tucker then calls out the flatterers, the ones who flocked to Trump and then turned on him the moment he lost power: Mike Pence, Nikki Haley, Mike Pompeo, Chris Christie. This episode is a must-watch by all Republicans who truly care about the survival of this country.