We have to talk about Van Jones. He came out on Friday with a nice story about a DM Charlie Kirk sent him just before he was killed. And as I am sure he predicted, it is now getting even conservatives to say nice things about him.
Well, I am not one of them. Not today. And I am going to explain to you why.
Past Experience
Let’s go back to when my life blew up at NBC News. You all know the story. I was twisting in the wind. All these news outlets were calling me a racist because I noted Halloween costumes weren’t considered cancellable back in the 1970s and 1980s when I grew up, and I asked when that changed. That is what caused the big controversy I got “canceled” for, and people literally were calling me a racist for asking that question.
Van Jones called me in the wake of that to see how I was doing. He said what happened to me was deeply wrong, and he asked if he could do anything to help. We had always been friendly, but it was very sweet and extra touching because he is a black man in media.
I said to him that it would definitely be helpful if he could say something publicly or write an op-ed, and he told me he would do it. I remember feeling relieved because I had very few defenders, if any. I had a couple on the right but nobody on the left.
A week or so went by and he hadn’t done it. When I followed up with him to see whether he was working on something, he said he changed his mind because he had recently done something with Jared Kushner and was getting death threats. He said the FBI said he really shouldn’t put himself out there.
I told him I understood and moved on. I wasn’t expecting anything from him in the first place. It was his offer; it was his to withdraw. But that story is one of the reasons why what he is doing now around Charlie really stood out to me.
The Initial Comments
So, what happened? The Monday before Charlie was killed, Van went on CNN and attacked him. Charlie had suggested that there was a racial motive, at least in part, in the slaying of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska on the light rail train in Charlotte, North Carolina. And the reason Charlie said that is because footage shows the suspect, who is black, saying “I got that white girl” after the stabbing.
It is on tape and Van either hadn’t done his homework or ignored it if he did know about it because he went on CNN Monday, September 8, and attacked Charlie as a racist for concluding race may have played a factor in this murder. Here is what Van said:
“We don’t know why that man did what he did. And for Charlie Kirk to say, ‘We know he did it because she’s white,’ when there’s no evidence of that is just pure race mongering, hate mongering. It’s wrong. Then he says that if something like that had happened the other way, there would be sweeping changes imposed on society. Where is the George Floyd Policing Act? It didn’t pass that… We don’t know how to deal with people who are hurting in the way this man was hurting. Hurt people hurt people.”
That was factually erroneous, and it was a smear. It was defamatory of Charlie Kirk. Literally every word out of his mouth was wrong, and, a day and a half later, Charlie was killed.
For the record, I said while I was live on the air covering the murder that this was not Van Jones’ fault. I was sure to point that out, and I maintain that position. I do not believe Van Jones caused Charlie Kirk to get shot, but I do believe the collective leftist messaging around prominent right-wing figures is endangering them – from Donald Trump to Stephen Miller to Charlie Kirk and beyond. That is my firm belief.
There is just too much evidence. Constantly throwing around the terms “fascist,” “racist,” “Nazi” is not okay. It is not that you don’t have the right to say. It is not that you should be arrested for it. I am not making an argument against the First Amendment. It’s that it is irresponsible. You are pouring fuel into a cauldron of hate that has now gotten one of ours killed and the most prominent leader of the Republican Party shot in the ear as one of his supporters behind him died in the arms of his family.
We are not screwing around anymore. It is not okay to go out there without any evidence that Charlie is a racist and when, in fact, you don’t have your facts correct and call him a racist on the national airwaves. It was totally irresponsible of you, Van. It was wrong, and you have yet to undo it.
The Big Reveal
I don’t think Van Jones is a bad man. I think he is a coward. When he saw what happened to Charlie that Wednesday, he clearly started to panic because he had been in a very public fight with Charlie Kirk. I believe Van Jones thought people would turn it on him, and he didn’t want that bad PR.
Because Van is not a bad man, I accept that he felt genuinely sad that Charlie was killed – but not so sad that he would go out and say he was totally wrong about everything he said about him. He didn’t do that. Instead, he came out with an op-ed this past Friday and revealed to the world that – surprise, surprise – Charlie was a good guy.
In an op-ed for CNN.com titled “Charlie Kirk DM’d me before he was murdered. Here’s what he said,” he wrote about the fact that Charlie messaged him the day before he died (the day after Van Jones attacked him on CNN) and he wanted to have him on The Charlie Kirk Show.
“Hey, Van, I mean it, I’d love to have you on my show to have a respectful conversation about crime and race,” Charlie wrote. “I would be a gentleman as I know you would be as well. We can disagree about the issues agreeably.”
Van marveled about this, writing that, before he could respond, “Charlie Kirk was killed — seemingly assassinated for the words he’s spoken, though the killer’s exact motives are still being investigated.”
Even this past Friday after the indictment, after we knew the mother told authorities her son “had become more political and had started to lean more to the left – becoming more pro-gay and trans-rights oriented,” after the governor of Utah blamed leftist ideology, after the text messages with the trans boyfriend were revealed, after we learned about the online furry connection, after we were told what was on the bullet casings, Van Jones’ claimed the killer’s “exact motives are still being investigated.” He still has to pretend it is a mystery.
He went on to write, “It was not hard for me to condemn his murder — immediately, without qualification and in unconditional terms.” That is true, but then look at what he said. “In fact: Kirk’s murder gives us all reason to come back to the table for dialogue,” he continued. “There is a rising tide of political violence that has already swept away his life and many others’ lives, from both the Left and the Right.”
No, it is your side, almost uniformly, doing the violence and the killing against us. Own it. Acknowledge it.
“Violence like this should compel people in both parties to turn down the heat, seek common ground and look for off-ramps from the vitriol — as Kirk was doing with me, the day before he died,” Van continued. “If you are on the Right, please don’t give up on open debate and dialogue. Charlie didn’t. I won’t. And I make the same plea to folks on the Left.”
He went on Anderson Cooper’s show Friday night to talk about the story and said he would not have accepted Charlie’s invitation because he “wasn’t trying to build his platform,” but he said he “would have called him.” He didn’t want to sit down with the likes of Charlie Kirk and drive viewers to his platform because he is so hateful. He was not backing off one bit of these lies about Charlie that ginned up hate around him in all pockets on the left – and who knows whether those pockets may have been in Utah as well.
Playing the Victim
During a separate appearance on CNN over the weekend, Van returned to a familiar refrain. “So, the last thing I expected was to hear from him. In fact, we were trying to deal with the wave of death threats and racial stuff that was coming at me in the middle of that controversy,” he said. “Look, I was the recipient myself of pretty caustic language from Charlie Kirk. And unfortunately a lot of his followers were even worse than that, frankly, much worse, including racist death threats.”
I am infuriated by that. Now you see why I told you about my experience. Behind the scenes to me it was all, ‘I got your back, and I’m going to stand up.’ And then it turned into, ‘I can’t because I’m getting death threats.’ And now he called Charlie a racist a day and a half before he was assassinated by somebody who said Charlie was “too full of hate” and “some hate can’t be negotiated out,” but he is trying to tell us he was a victim because he was getting death threats from Charlie’s supporters.
This whole thing is bullshit. This is the tool that he goes to: ‘Death threats against me.’ ‘I’m the victim.”Death threats so I can’t do the op-ed.’ ‘Death threats because of what Charlie said about me.’ No, you are the offender. You are the one who called him a racist, totally unjustified, on CNN and didn’t have the guts to correct it when you knew it was untrue.
You made the mistake, and now you want credit for telling us that he invited you on his show; that he was a gentleman; that he actually did want dialogue; that he, unlike you, was not behaving fraudulently. But you also want us to know that his people are all racists who are sending you “racist death threats” after you unjustifiably called Charlie a racist.
I’m done. How do we deal with that? How do we do what he said in the op-ed and “go forward together,” not “give up on open debate and dialogue,” “turn down the heat,” “seek common ground,” and “look for off-ramps” because that’s what Charlie did? You called him a racist and now you are out there telling us you are the victim of death threats. You are not the victim.
Be bold, Van. Say what you actually mean. When you screw it up, apologize and take it back like a man. And don’t fall back on alleged “death threats,” which is your go-to to excuse for your own terrible behavior. That is what you are doing, and it is infuriating.
You can check out Megyn’s full analysis by tuning in to episode 1,154 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.