Fox News personality Sean Hannity was widely mocked after guest commentator Stephanie Miller gave him more than he bargained for with her response to his question about when she first noticed former President Joe Biden's "cognitive decline."
President Donald Trump and Republicans have long questioned Biden's cognitive fitness for office to draw attention from Trump's own gaffes. Earlier this week, Trump made headlines for claiming "no one knows what magnets are" during an Oval Office exchange. He has also continued to attract attention for falling asleep during events.
But that wasn't on Hannity's mind—nor did he seem particularly interested in the actual big story of the week: the release of emails in which the late financier, pedophile, and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein claimed that Trump “knew about the girls” and spent “hours” at his house with one of Epstein’s victims.
Hannity asked:
"When did you first notice Joe Biden's cognitive decline? And don't change the subject or deflect."
Miller replied:
"I think it was through all the times that Donald Trump has fallen asleep in public and talked about magnets getting wet. My mom had dementia and I recognize it."
"You know what else is great about Biden's cognitive decline is that Trump is all over the Epstein files and I'm wondering if they're going to release those. Are you covering that tonight?"
At another point, Miller said:
“You know the funniest thing about this story — is Trump’s all over the Epstein files and I wonder if they’re going to release that after the big bombshell! I didn’t see anything about that on Fox News today."
"Let's release those files. Let's release them. Is this what passes for news? Is this what passes for news on Fox News?"
This week, a report from Media Matters for America (MMA) published November 12 noted that Fox "is covering up for President Donald Trump after House Democrats released emails on Wednesday" and "had not addressed the story on its airwaves through noon ET, even as CNN and MSNBC gave it substantial coverage."
The report mentioned that "a Fox correspondent referenced 'new developments today from the House Oversight Committee' on Epstein without detailing what those developments entailed."
The report found that as of noon Wednesday, "CNN and MSNBC had covered the story for 53 and 56 minutes, respectively. By comparison, Fox's coverage amounted to 6 seconds (the above-mentioned vague reference to 'new developments')."
Hannity and the network have faced heavy criticism since Miller's appearance.
The White House has continued to deflect from the files via Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, who called the scandal a "manufactured hoax" and tried to pin the blame on the Biden administration.
Leavitt insisted Democrats "don't care about the victims in these cases" and that only "care about scoring political points against President Trump and with this government shutdown." She alleged "Democrats leaked these emails to the fake news this morning ahead of Republicans reopening the government."
Trump echoed Leavitt's response, saying in a post on Truth Social that Democrats "are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again because they’ll do anything at all to deflect on how badly they’ve done on the Shutdown, and so many other subjects."
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