‘Blunder?!’ CNN’s Kasie Hunt Floored By Scott Jennings Calling Lutnick’s Epstein Lies a ‘PR Blunder’

CNN anchor Kasie Hunt pushed back on Scott Jennings after the conservative commentator called Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick’s falsehoods about his relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein a “public relations blunder.”

Jennings joined The Arena on Wednesday to discuss Attorney General Pam Bondi’s bombshell hearing in Congress on Wednesday and her department’s continued release of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein.

The DOJ’s latest release of over 3 million pages of Epstein documents appeared to contradict previous statements made by President Donald Trump’s commerce head, Lutnick, who claimed to have cut ties with Epstein in 2005. The Senate Committee on Appropriations held a hearing on Tuesday where Secretary Lutnick was grilled about his mischaracterization of his ties to Epstein, which documents showed continued past 2005 and included a visit to Epstein’s private island.

Hunt played a clip from the hearing where Lutnick admitted to the visit before heatedly pressing Scott Jennings on his defense of commerce secretary, alongside New York Times journalist Lulu Garcia-Navarro. 

Read their exchange below:

HUNT: I mean, you can’t make this sh*t up. You can’t, Scott. You cannot make it up. And this is like– his name was redacted in these files.

JENNINGS: Yeah, I don’t know why you’re yelling at me, but I mean–

[crosstalk]

HUNT: I mean this is– this story, I mean, this is something that was labeled as a conspiracy theory, you know by some people on the left, you know, during the campaigns for sure. And you have rightly criticized the [Joe] Biden administration and others for not doing more about it. But it turns out that the people that said that there was something really, really, really wrong here that was being covered up were correct.

JENNINGS: Well I don’t think Lutnick’s committed any–

HUNT: And now the Trump administration has a chance to make it right.

JENNINGS: I don’t think Lutnick’s committed any crimes. Now, this was a huge f–up of a–

NAVARRO: No, he lied.

JENNINGS: Of a PR–

NAVARRO: No, no. No, no. No, no. It’s not PR. He lied. He lied.

JENNINGS: Yeah, but he didn’t commit any crimes.

HUNT: He said he had never– I, look, it was a podcast–

[crosstalk]

JENNINGS: I am in agreement with you. I am in agreement with you that obviously this is a horrible public relations blunder. He did not commit any crimes. There’s a big difference between making a PR blunder and lying.

HUNT: It’s a public relations blunder to say in public you never spent time with a pedophile, when in fact, you know, you had and you didn’t actually cop to it until you were forced to and you were under oath?! I mean, like–

JENNINGS: Of course it’s a blunder. I mean, are you saying it’s not?

HUNT: I’m saying that it might be more than a blunder. That perhaps you are understating the case.

JENNINGS: Is it a crime? Is it a crime?

HUNT: I’m not arguing that it’s a crime, Scott. It’s just like lets, like– blunder?!

JENNINGS: You have pointed out that he said something that wasn’t true. I presented the evidence. We have agreed that it is a blunder and that you shouldn’t lie about it. What more what more do you want to do?

NAVARO: Well is lying– is this administration not saying that lying about something in the public interest like this is not– there should be no accountability about that.accountability about that. Because if you’ve looked at what’s happened in the UK–

HUNT: I was going to say, the king of England has put out statements about this type of activity that are stronger than blunder.

Watch above via CNN’s The Arena. 

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