Tucker Carlson claims that a demon attack left him bleeding in bed

Tucker Carlson, the former CNN and Fox News political chat host, has said he was “physically mauled” by a demon a year and a half ago, in an assault that he says left him bleeding and with scars from “claw marks”.

Carlson made the claim while speaking in an upcoming documentary, Christianities? In a preview clip on YouTube, Carlson is asked by John Heers of the non-profit First Things Foundation if he believed that “the presence of evil is kickstarting people to wonder about the good”.

“That’s what happened to me. I had a direct experience with it,” said Carlson.

Asked if he was referring to journalism, Carlson responded: “No, in my bed at night. I got attacked while I was asleep with my wife and four dogs and mauled, physically mauled.”

Carlson, who said he still bears the scars, said his assailant was a “demon”. He added: “Or by something unseen that left claw marks on my sides.”

He said at the time of the attack, he was asleep in bed. I was “totally confused, I woke up, and I couldn’t breathe, and I thought I was going to suffocate”, he said.

“I walked around outside and then I walked in and my wife and dogs had not woken up. And they’re very light sleepers. And then I had these terrible pains on my rib cage and on my shoulder, and I was just in my boxer shorts and I went and flipped on the light in the bathroom, and I had four claw marks on either side underneath my arms and on my left shoulder. And they’re bleeding.”

He added that he explained the encounter to an assistant, an evangelical Christian, who told him: “That happens, people are attacked in their bed by demons.”

Carlson, who lives in the woods of Maine, did not say where the attack occurred, but called it a “transformative experience” that left him “seized with this very intense desire to read the Bible”.

Carlson, who was fired from Fox News after the company paid more than $787m to settle a lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems over false statements and conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, is stumping for Donald Trump on the campaign trial.

He addressed a rally in Georgia last week, telling Trump supporters that the candidate’s possible return to the White House was like a father returning home and Trump would give the country a “vigorous spanking”.

“He’s not vengeful. He loves his children. Disobedient as they may be, he loves them. Because they’re his children. They live in his house. But he’s very disappointed in their behavior. And he’s going to have to let them know,” Carlson said.

“When Dad gets home, you know what he says? ‘You’ve been a bad girl. You’ve been a bad little girl, and you’re getting a vigorous spanking right now.’”