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The man replacing a coveted prime-time cable television slot once occupied by right-wing figurehead Tucker Carlson is a longtime Fox News presence who honed his reputation on the network with brash man-on-the-street interviews and derisive commentary attacking Democratic officials and his liberal rivals. Jesse Watters has been with the network for more than two decades, wearing the influence of a generation of Fox News stars and right-wing radio figures that preceded him. The changeup follows Carlson’s departure from the network in the aftermath of a pair of lawsuits and a $787.5m settlement reached with a voting machine company that sued Fox and its leadership for defamation. A rotating lineup of hosts filled the 8pm hour in the weeks that followed. Watters – who helmed the previous hour – will permanently fill that later slot in the network’s schedule with his Jesse Watters Primetime. “Unlike Carlson, he lacks a well-defined ideological agenda, apart from looking for ways to ‘own the libs’ on whatever the news of the day is,” according to MSNBC columnist Paul Waldman. “There may be plenty of Fox viewers who will happily tune in to that for an hour each night. But Watters is effectively an internet troll who happens to be on TV,” he wrote. “If you want a detailed breakdown of the latest right-wing obsession, he’s not the one you’d seek out; if on the other hand you merely want someone to smirk while delivering a zinger about Hunter Biden, Watters is your man.” Like Carlson, Watters comes from a prominent media family and is a product of exclusive East Coast private schooling. But unlike Carlson, who arrived at Fox after on-air roles at competing networks MSNBC and CNN, Watters is something of a Fox company man, moving up in the ranks over more than 20 years while adopting the hostile posture and talking points of some of its biggest stars, with a self-satisfied grin. Watters ascribes his political awakening to watching Republican members of Congress on C-SPAN. From there, he devoutly listened to right-wing radio and pundits like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, whose influence is seared into his provocative personality. By 2011, Watters helmed his own recurring segment on Bill O’Reilly’s The O’Reilly Factor. His “Watters World” reports would rely on man-on-the-street interviews, quick edits and frequent cutaways to movie clips to ridicule frequent right-wing targets, from college campus culture to people experiencing homelessness. Those reports and his other statements on the network over the years have drawn widespread criticism and accusations of sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, and election denialism, including incendiary statements aired days before the attack on the US Capitol. In one of his segments in 2015, Watters interviewed homeless New Yorkers at Penn Station to accuse them of breaking the law. He would go on to declare homeless people an “invasive species” on his own programme in 2022. A 2016 “Watters World” segment from Manhattan’s Chinatown was widely derided as a racist and stereotype-driven production that prompted a rare response from Watters. “My man-on-the-street interviews are meant to be taken as tongue-in-cheek and I regret if anyone found offense,” he said. That same year, it was revealed that he was accused of stalking and harassing journalist Amanda Terkel seven years earlier, an incident that led to an altercation between Watters and another journalist at an afterparty following a White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. “I was at this party trying to enjoy myself. This guy came up to me. He starts putting it in my face,” Watters later said. “I was friendly at first, and then he started getting a little obnoxious. Things happened, and I regret it happened, and that’s all it is.” On The Five, the network’s roundtable talk show on which Watters has been a longtime co-host, he claimed without evidence in 2019 that women reporters sleep with sources “all the time” in an apparent reference to the portrayal of a journalist in the film Richard Jewell. In 2021, Watters encouraged the audience at a conservative political conference to “ambush” Dr Anthony Fauci and deliver a figurative “kill shot” against the nation’s leading infectious disease expert. Fauci, then the chief White House medical adviser, called on Fox to fire Watters. The network defended him in a statement and promoted him a few weeks later. He also has repeatedly defended Mr Trump, including a warning that “people better be careful” and that “the left” doesn’t “understand what they’re getting themselves into” following news of the former president’s criminal indictment in New York City. The Independent requested comment from Fox regarding Watters’ statements. A spokesperson for the network provided a network statement announcing the lineup changes. “FOX News Channel has been America’s destination for news and analysis for more than 21 years and we are thrilled to debut a new lineup. The unique perspectives of Laura Ingraham, Jesse Watters, Sean Hannity, and Greg Gutfeld will ensure our viewers have access to unrivaled coverage from our best-in-class team for years to come,” Fox News Media CEO Suzanne Scott said in the statement. Right-wing media watchdog group Media Matters has chronicled Watters’ controversial on-air statements throughout his time at the network. “Crowning odious Jesse Watters as the new face of Fox News is a reflection of Fox’s dogged commitment to bigotry and deceit as well as an indication of their desperation to regain audience share,” Media Matters president Angelo Carusone said in a statement. “It won’t work, though. Fox’s audience abandoned the network post-Tucker, and those viewers never returned,” he added. “Jesse Watters’ buffoonish segments of bigotry and culture war vitriol won’t fix that problem for Fox; he’s a liability and a ticking time bomb. Read More Fox News ousts eight remaining Tucker Carlson show staff as Jesse Watters takes over primetime spot White House condemns Fox News chyron calling Biden ‘wannabe dictator’ as broadcaster walks back accusation Trump reacts angrily as Fox News anchor directly tells him: ‘You lost the 2020 election’

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A raid by Russian security services has revealed the colourful inside of mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin’s lavish mansion in St Petersburg. A wardrobe full of wigs, gold bars and a stuffed alligator were among the many bizarre finds in photos and footage published by pro-Kremlin media outlet Izvestia. Officials are also said to have found assault weapons, ammunition and even a photograph allegedly showing the severed heads of the Wagner leader’s enemies. A lengthy indoor swimming pool complete with a bathing area, slides and even a jacuzzi can also be seen in the photographs, with the rooms lit up with what appear to be glass chandeliers. Elsewhere, the contents of a wardrobe show an array of wigs with colours ranging from grey to a mousy brown, with photos purportedly showing the Wagner chief wearing them as a disguise leaked to state-backed Russian Telegram channels. The photographs, apparently taken from Mr Prigozhin’s personal photo albums, appear to have been taken during trips to various African and Middle Eastern countries where Wagner have had a presence in recent years. Wagner was founded in 2014 and was involved in operations in Ukraine’s eastern regions. In subsequent years, it has fought in countries such as Syria, Libya, and the Central African Republic. In a programme called 60 Minutes, broadcast on the state-run Rossiya-1 TV channel, it was claimed that cash worth 600 million roubles (£5m) had been found in the Wagner chief’s properties. Mr Prigozhin has previously said that Wagner only dealt in cash, with Russian president Vladimir Putin recently admitting that the group was financed by the state. With the Russian president saying Wagner had received more than 86 billion rubles (£790bn) between May 2022 and May 2023 for wages and additional items. That had come out of the defence ministry and state budgets. For years prior to Mr Putin’s speech late last month the Kremlin had denied any links to the Wagner group. The programme also showed multiple passports under different names. “A normal person can’t have so many passports,” Petrov said. “Why did this person have such strange powers like the serious leader of some kind of criminal group.” On Thursday, Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko said that Prigozhin was no longer in Belarus, having brokered a deal last month to end an armed mutiny in Russia. His Wagner troops have remained at the camps they stayed in before an attempted mutiny against Moscow. “As for Prigozhin, he’s in St Petersburg. He is not on the territory of Belarus”, Lukashenko told reporters, having said last week that Prigozhin was still in Belarus. Mr Prigozhin took control of the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don on 24 June, seizing the command centre there and then taking a column of fighters towards Moscow before standing down after striking a deal broked by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a staunch ally of Mr Putin. The agreement was meant to see Mr Prigozhin relocate to Belarus that criminal charges against him and Wagner over the attempted mutiny would be dropped. However, it was stated during the Rossiya-1 broadcast that “nobody planned to close this case... The investigation is ongoing.” Read More The Body in the Woods | An Independent TV Original Documentary The harrowing discovery at centre of The Independent’s new documentary Putin claims Russia is united than ever just days after Wagner troops march on Moscow Ukraine war – live: Exiled Wagner boss Prigozhin ‘back in Russia weeks after failed mutiny’ How many casualties has Russia suffered in Ukraine? Russian missile attack on Lviv, Ukraine, kills 3 people and wounds more, mayor says Devastating aftermath of deadly Lviv attack captured in drone footage