A Trumpy CNN pundit’s attempt to defend the Justice Department’s sloppy handling of the Epstein files backfired spectacularly when he was called out for an embarrassing flaw in his own argument.
Scott Jennings jumped in on NewsNight With Abby Phillip late Thursday when a fellow panelist pointed out that Americans don’t know “who to trust” when it comes to the Trump administration’s claims on the Epstein files. Jennings immediately tried to steer the discussion to Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna, who he claimed had “doxed” a handful of individuals by telling Congress he’d seen their names in the Epstein files.
“What did you think about when your colleague Ro Khanna went down to the House floor and doxed four people who apparently had nothing to do with this whatsoever?” he asked Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi. “Did you think that was a good use of time?”
Khanna and Rep. Thomas Massie reviewed unredacted documents as part of their bipartisan campaign to get the Department of Justice to rerelease some files, claiming details had been unlawfully hidden from the public.
Earlier this month, Khanna named six “wealthy, powerful men” whose names had previously been redacted from the public files. Two of the men, Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem and Leslie Wexner, have been identified. But four of them proved baffling, as they appeared to have no public profile.
After Khanna demanded answers on who the four individuals were and why they had been redacted, the DOJ said they had no connection to child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and had merely appeared in a photo lineup in the Southern District of New York.
MAGA figures were quick to blast Khanna for what they described as vilifying innocent people, and Jennings echoed that line, accusing Khanna of doxing.
The conversation went around in circles as Jennings clashed with members of the panel, later arguing, “It has nothing to do with redactions. It has to do with the fact that a member of Congress went down and doxed people who did nothing wrong and had nothing to do with it.”
The conversation erupted again, culminating in a final word from Phillip, whose voice won out above the free-for-all. “Revealing people’s names is not doxing,” she said. “It is not doxing—let me just make this point. It is not doxing to name a person, it is not what doxing is.”
Merriam-Webster says the definition of “dox” is “to publicly identify or publish private information about (someone), especially as a form of punishment or revenge.”
Elsewhere in the conversation, Phillip questioned the popular MAGA argument against people in the Epstein files having their names made public.
Redactions are meant only to protect victims and prevent the disclosure of sensitive materials. The DOJ’s handling of the files has been panned across the board for erratic redactions and missed release deadlines.
“Hold on,” she said. “I‘ve heard this be brought up a few times, and frankly, I‘m not understanding what the argument is. Are those people in the Epstein files? Hold on, are they victims of Jeffrey Epstein?”
“They‘re victims of Ro Khanna,” Jennings said.
Phillips pushed the point: “No, no, are they victims of Jeffrey Epstein?”
“I don‘t think so,” said Jennings
“So what does the law say about whether or not their names ought to be redacted in the file?” the host pushed. Jennings, at this point, said it was not about redactions but doxing.
Speaking to The Guardian, a spokesperson for Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said that the lineup of the six individuals had been for investigative purposes, and that “Rep Ro Khanna and Rep Thomas Massie forced the unmasking of completely random people selected years ago for an FBI lineup—men and women. These individuals have NOTHING to do with Epstein or Maxwell.”
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