Media Responsibility

Conservative news show host Megyn Kelly sought to lessen the severity of Jeffry Epstein's crimes. This op-ed looks at one possible reason why. (Credit: Gage Skidmore, Flickr) It’s hard to imagine a less appropriate time to get caught up in semantics, than when discussing victims of sexual assault. Yet Megyn Kelly did precisely that this week. The host of a self-named Sirius XM show used her platform to downplay the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein, the former financier and convicted sex trafficker who died in prison in 2019. During a recent on-air segment, Kelly went on something of a tangent regarding Epstein’s misdeeds, a frankly bizarre conversational thread that saw her attempting to lessen the severity of them in light of the victims’ ages. "I know somebody very close to this case, Jeffrey Epstein, in this person's view, was not a pedophile – he was into the ‘barely legal type,’” Kelly said. She went on to note that Epstein “wasn’t into, like, 8-year-olds. But he liked the very young teen types that could pass for even younger than they were, but would look legal to a passerby.” Kelly added: “There's a difference between a 15-year-old and a 5-year-old." Sure – technically speaking, a pedophile is a person who is attracted to prepubescent children, specifically. But let’s be clear: A 15-year-old is still very much a child. At that age, one cannot legally drive a car, or vote, or drink alcohol. And, one cannot legally consent to sex anywhere in the U.S. (In most states, 16 is the delineation point – and “almost” doesn’t matter.) Moreover, a 15-year-old is in the dawn of their life. And in that confusing, exciting, pivotal time – that’s when Epstein and his cohorts made use of their victims. They abused them, for fleeting moments of pleasure. A deeply entitled and deeply demeaning violation that irrevocably changed the trajectories of the victims’ lives. Kelly’s take is tantamount to: At least they weren’t younger. That would have been a real crime. It’s About Trump Her rhetoric is especially reprehensible, and confusing at first, when you consider that she endured harassment herself, having come from a workplace – Fox News – that was once run by a different predatory, powerful man (former chairman Roger Ailes) and was rife with enablers. The thing is, though, when folks like her former colleague, Bill O’Reilly, defended Ailes years ago, Kelly was quick to condemn the sentiment. “Women everywhere are used to being dismissed, ignored or attacked when raising complaints about men in authority positions," Kelly said in 2017. "They stay silent so often out of fear — fear of ending their careers, fear of lawyers, yes, and often fear of public shaming." Around the same time, actor Scott Baio was facing his own allegations. During an interview with his accuser, Kelly asserted: " There's no consenting for a 14- or even a 17-year-old." At some point between then and now, she became willing to compromise on the well-being of teenagers. The question is: Why? And the answer likely lies in the fact that she has been an increasingly vocal proponent of the Trump administration – and President Donald Trump himself is one of the more powerful individuals suspected to be on Epstein’s client list. As the 2024 presidential election was reaching its end, Kelly was even present on the campaign trail, endorsing Trump loudly. "He will be a protector of women. And it's why I'm voting for him," she said at a campaign event – about a man who once joked about her menstrual cycle because she asked him tough questions during a debate, and who was found guilty of falsifying financial records to cover up other sexual transgressions of his. Trump has famously wanted the Epstein story to go away – especially now, given the number of times he was mentioned in a recently released deluge of emails from the case. Earlier this year, he tried to downplay them matter himself, when survivors of the sex trafficking ring spoke out in Washington, D.C., calling upon Congress to release the case files and expose those who harmed them. After their press conference, Trump waved the demonstration away as merely a “Democrat hoax that never ends.” He continued, “They’re trying to get people to talk about something that’s totally irrelevant to the success that we’ve had as a nation since I’ve been president.” And now, he has Kelly’s assistance in making this mountain appear to be a molehill – because minimizing Epstein’s wrongdoing does the same for any of the people who sought his services. Kelly did get one thing right in her most recent segment. “The whole thing is just disgusting,” she pointed out – not realizing how her own words, and her willingness to downplay victims’ suffering for the sake of the wannabe autocrat she supports, falls under that same heading. ◼️

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