Tucker Carlson made a pair of visits to the White House in the last two weeks, having lunch with President Donald Trump two Fridays in a row.

Reached by Jewish Insider, the White House did not say what the purpose of Carlson’s two visits were but confirmed that the far-right commentator and the president had lunch during the second visit. The meeting came one week after Carlson was spotted at a White House gathering for about a dozen oil executives for a discussion about how to best utilize Venezuela’s oil reserves following the U.S. operation that deposed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. 

Carlson was seen in pictures standing against a wall in the East Room during the event on social media later that day. 

Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were scheduled to have lunch with Trump on the day of Carlson’s first visit, according to the president’s public schedule on Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. Carlson also joined the lunch, which took place prior to the event with oil executives, despite his name not being included on the public calendar. 

Carlson told the National Review’s Audrey Fahlberg last Saturday that he “had no idea there was an oil event in progress — that’s not why I came — but he invited me to come with him after lunch, so I went.”

Asked what the agenda was for the first meeting, Carlson replied: “[Trump] asked me to lunch on a topic that had nothing to do with Venezuela or oil. It was happenstance that the oil meeting was in progress. I go up regularly to see him and always have the best time.”

Pictures of Carlson in the Oval Office with Trump, Rubio, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and other senior administration officials on Friday began circulating on social media shortly after his visit.

It is not clear who at the White House extended an invitation to Carlson for either of the trips, though the former Fox host has remained friendly with Trump and is close friends with Vance. 

Carlson has maintained access to the White House despite regularly pushing antisemitic conspiracy theories on his podcast, while hosting figures like neo-Nazi influencer Nick Fuentes and podcaster Darryl Cooper, a Holocaust denier who has made a name out of claiming Winston Churchill was the main villain of World War II, not Adolf Hitler. 

Asked who invited Carlson to the White House, a spokesperson for Vance only confirmed that Carlson was at the White House for a lunch on Friday. The spokesperson did not address JI’s inquiry whether the vice president had invited Carlson to the White House for either visit.