Meghan McCain has rushed to the defense of Fox News star Tucker Carlson after he was confronted by a Montana man who told him he was the "worst human being known to mankind" while out shopping at a sporting goods store.
The View host condemned Dan Bailey, who went viral and garnered praise online after he challenged the controversial right-wing commentator for spreading COVID-19 and vaccine misinformation.
McCain dubbed Bailey "a total jackass" and "incredibly rude", calling his actions "dangerous".
"As incendiary as many people find Tucker Carlson, they find the women on this show equally incendiary for different reasons. If it's okay and should be expected, maybe there's an expectation that wherever we go, it's okay for people to come up to us and scream things and say things," she said.
Several of McCain's co-hosts felt that while public confrontations of that nature weren't ideal, Carlson had invited criticism and anger with his views, including the assertion that people who wear masks outside are "zealots and neurotics" adding that members of the public should call the police on parents who put masks on their children.
"This isn't normal," McCain insisted. "I think any rationalisation that this is normal or should be accepted in the United States of America is not only indecent, but it's beyond the pale of any expectation of any kind of decorum in a society like the United States of America.
"Anyone who tries to rationalize it is gross. That man should apologise to Tucker Carlson."
Meanwhile, support for Bailey continues to grow on Twitter, where he is being heralded with the hashtag #MontanaMan.
"Thank you for your service!" one tweet stated, while another said Bailey had done more in 30 seconds "to call out Tucker Carlson's bullshit than Facebook has done over the last four years".
In a statement provided to local media after the video of the confrontation went viral, a spokesperson for Fox News said the confrontation was "totally inexcusable".
"Ambushing Tucker Carlson while he is in a store with his family is totally inexcusable - no public figure should be accosted regardless of their political persuasion or beliefs simply due to the intolerance of another point of view."
