Fox News host Tucker Carlson claimed Friday that the so-called strike by children for environmental action was actually stage-managed by adults for political purposes.

Speaking on his Tucker Carlson Tonight, Carlson said that the millions of children who skipped school around the world were part of a “coordinated left-wing political protest. It was called Climate Strike. So naturally, MSNBC was there to cheer them on.”

Carlson contended that although the day news anchors assured their viewers that the strike wasbeing led by the kids, “They were lying, of course. Like all activist movements, the climate strike was organized by cynical adults — adults hoping to exploit children for political purposes, obviously. The other lie you heard today is that the strike was about the environment. It was not about the environment. The main goal of the protesters in this country, for example, was to implement Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal.”

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Citing Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff, who said the Green New Deal is not about the environment, Carlson said, “The environmental movement itself has all but given up on the environment. Don’t believe it? Look around. Is our country cleaner than it was? No. It’s dirtier, and it’s more crowded, and it gets more of both of those things every year. The left doesn’t care. They’re cheering it on. Why? Because they want power. And in climate change, they found an emergency big enough to justify grabbing more power, in fact, taking control of everything. Don’t believe it? Check out the manifesto of Youth Climate Strike. That’s one of the group’s leading today’s strike.”

The document Carlson touted calls for such non-environmental demand as state-owned banks, affordable housing, single-payer healthcare, and expanded rights for sexual minorities, among other issues. “Now, you may agree with those political goals, or you may disagree. But what do they have to do with the environment? Obviously, nothing. But whatever. Full speed ahead.”

Carlson concluded his statement by comparing the agenda to Mao’s Great Leap Forward. “And there you have the modern left’s climate agenda: no drinking straws, no automobiles, no airplanes, no meat, no democracy. In their place, endless propaganda and a parade of 15-year-old Red Guards yelling at you to stay in line. That’s what they’re promising. All of a sudden, the future really does that bleak, and it has nothing to do with rising temperatures.”