“It looks to me like Woodward hyped that claim,” Carlson said of Woodward’s assertion that he had been threatened by White House advisor Gene Sperling. Carlson said that Woodward replied to the so-called threat by writing “Gene, you do not ever have to apologize to me.”

MacCallum suggested that Woodward was probably just being polite in an attempt to keep the lines of communication with his sources in the White House open.

“I gotta say, this offers a window into how Washington actually works,” Carlson added. “The kind of suck-upy, air-kissy relationship between reporter and source. It’s a little bit, to be honest about it, hard to claim you were threatened when you’re writing an email saying, ‘you never need to apologies to me. I’ll see you at lunch!’”