Jussie smollett bond hearing. In the end the courtroom drama could not hold a candle to what happened outside. D while smollett was settling up his 100,000 bond, a prosecutor from the Cook County State Attorneys Office spent 20 plus minutes detailing the entire case including statements from the brothers who claimed smollett staged the whole thing. Watch. Smollett stated that he wanted them to appear to attack him on the evening of january 28th, 2019, near his Apartment Building in streeter phil. Smollett said he he wanted the brothersal to capture his attention by calling him entire f, entire n. Chicago Police Superintendenten eddy johnson who was differential to smolletts claim said he weighs offended by the actors actions. Watch. How can an individual who has been embraced by the city of chicago turn around and slap everyone in this city in the face by making these false claims . And Chicago Tribune columnist john cass points out Chicago Police solve about 17 of the citys thousands homicides. Even with the departments thin resources two dozen investigators were assigned to the smollett case and today, superintendent johnson cited that. Watch. As i look out into the crowd, i just wish that the families of gun violence in this city got this much hecattention because thats who really deserves the amount of attention that we are giving to this particular incident. Johnson went on to say he realizes the city of chicago has a racial divide and its hard for the city and country to come together. He also wonders how this might impact future cases. Listen. Ha my n concern is that hate crimes will now publicly be met with a level of skepticism that previously didnt happen. We should note smollett could also face federal charges for allegedly sending himself a phony threat letterre containing white powderin which turned out to be tylenol. His next Court Appearance march 14th. Tucker . Tucker trace gallagher, thanks for that. Well, there is at least one big unanswered question in the case of Jussie Smollett tonight. Why would this happen . Why would a popular actor on a Network Tv Show someone rich and successful and famous pay peopleeo to assault him and risk going to jail in the process . At press conference in chicago today a Police Superintendent wondered the same thing. Im left hanging my head and asking why. Why would anyone, especially an africanamerican man use the symbolism of a noose to make false accusations . How could someone look at the hatred c and suffering associated with that symbol and see an opportunity to manipulate that symbol to further his own public pry file. Tucker thats a fair question. What smollett not only did illegal and weird it was terrible for the country. Why did he do it . The short answer appears to be he wanted a raise at work and he thought this would get him that the broader answer we should all meditate on he was responding to the incentives the American Society has created i for him. Smollett pretended to be a victim because we reward victims. We decided its more heroic to suffer than it is to achieve. Thats the message of our culture, our politics, our workplaces. Jussie smollett was doing his best to get ahead heaccording to the rules that others made. In fact, had his hoax succeeded, there is no doubt smollett would have been richly rewarded for it probably get a significant bump in pay and extended segment on colbert. He would have been a hero. So Jussie Smollett was not crazy. He knew exactly what he was doing. Fake ago hate crime was entrepreneurial move. In america victimhood is powerful. Thats why so many powerful people claim it thats why Elizabeth Warren pretended to beel an american indian. Why every low point during the entire span of his political career barack obama invoked bias. Thats why so many politicians do the same today. I have suffered, you cannot criticize me. Academic left instructed entire theology around the holiness of victimhood,li its called interintersectionality. Every group is assessed according to how much it has suffered. The more your group has been discriminated against the more moral authority you receive. A pretty good deal for a lot of people and they have no interest in changing it. That explains why some on the left initially jumped to Jussie Smolletts defense. They werent simply defending him. They were defending identity politics. We can give you any number of examples of this but skip ahead to the most nauseating one of all. Watch anchor Robin Roberts of abc quote news beam with joy after smollett finishes the most dishonest performance of his life and then tell him his lies are beautiful. I still want to believe with everything that happened that there is something called justice. Because if i stop believing that, then whats it all for . Thank you, jussie. Tucker thank you, jussie. Well, before he claimed that White Supremacists beat him up on the street most people had never heard of Jussie Smollett. Aftertt he became a victim everybody wanted to be his friend. Here is don lemon over on cnn bragging how he texts his new pal jussie every day. He has his cell number. Thats how close they are. Really tight. Is my c concern is for him. Right. And for his wellbeing. Every day i say i know you think im annoying i can show you the text. I know you think im annoying you i just want to know how you are. That you are okay. That you are okay. If you need somebody, you can talk to me because there is not a lot of us out there. And sometimes he responds. Sometimes he doesnt. He says you be not annoying. Tucker you can talk to me don lemon says because there is not a lot of us out there. Here is the translation. Us is the people oppressed the any Jussie Smollett has been oppressed. Lemon is letting you know he is in k that group too. Yes is he a highlyis paid news anchor w. A his own tv show yet like Jussie Smollett don lemon is a wholly victim. Mad scramble over who is the victim here . Who is the victim . What smollett did is not a victimless crime. No such thing as that entire group of people did get slandered byby this hoax. Regular people from outside the coastal cities. People with the wrong political beliefs and skin color. Smollett and his many defenders savagely attacked these people and not apologizing for doing it instead they are telling you and hearing it everywhere. The real losers are authentic victims who wont be believed the next time. Okay. Thats fine. What about the innocent americans they just poured venom on for two weeks because it matched some bigoted stereotypes they had been b. America . What about them . No mention of them. Don lemon like to keep up those attacks. Wh attacks allows him to to feel oppressed. When smollett was caught lemon reacted in a puzzling way. Didnt seem concern that his buddy had lied further divide the country troy hurt america which he did, no, that wasnt the real problem. R the real, problem, according to don lemon is that smolletts arrest might discredit the occult of victimhood. This is playing out every single moment in cable news. Sean hannity is going to eat Jussie Smolletts lunch every single second. Tucker carlson is going to eat Jussie Smolletts lunch every single second. Tucker yeah, because when you tell the truth about a hate hoax you are the realat hater. Whats the cost of this attitude so floridly on display to our society . Ty what does it do to us . Think ofs it this way . What would happen to your kids if you woke them up every morning by telling them that they were victims . No matter how hard they worked people would always hate them just for who they are . What if did you that . Would that be Good Parenting . Would it make your kids stronger, happier, more successful . No, it wouldnt. Good parents would never do that. Good parents tell their kids to take responsibility for their lives not to blame others, to work as hard as they can to overcome obstacles thats what good parents of all of races and all backgroundd tell their kids. If you dont believe it, just ask 10 well adjusted accomplished people if their parents allowed them to feel like victims. A again, doesnt matter where they are from orth what they look like. Did your parents tell you are a victim and not one of them will say yes. Yet, we tell our citizens just the opposite. You see the effects very clearly in the workplace, for example. In the years after the 2008 recession, there was enormous surge of claims of workplace bias of all kinds. There is still no evidence that bigotry itself increased at all during those years. Ea yet, when people felt threatened by a teetering economy they knew claiming victimhood status would give them advantage. Can you blame them . No you cant. Of not really. They didnt write the rules of our society. They are following the rules like people like don lemon wrote but at great cost. Pierce morgan editoratlarge of. Pierce, as a guy who has been in the News Business for a long time, you must be wondering why were the reporters followingpo this the most credulous of all . Why didnt they smell a rat . Perfect storm the victimhood culture where you so brilliantly articulated there meets trumpp derangement syndrome this disease which has afflicted to many particularly liberal celebrities. Andit i think in Jussie Smollett had you greed as a motivation, but you also had he wanted to be a celebrity victim as you said. He wanted people to feel sorry for him to like him to retweet him. But, also, he wanted to use the prism of his hatred for donald trump and all things trump as the bedrock for this. They had to be two white Trump Supporters in making America Great again caps who attacked him because he knew that would be the perfect vehicle to turn him into american hero. That actually if he was attacked by Trump Supporters who lynched or tried to lynch him with a noose and really, you know, committed one of the worst hate crimes imaginable, then he, Jussie Smollett, would become a hero and he would be a heroic victim and, in fact, he went further in the Robin Roberts interview he said that he fought back against these two guys. Well we have now seen the size. These are two very big men. And, our hero, jussie fought back he is a victim but a hero who also fought back. I look at this whole story. I tweet every day all day. And i write columns two or three times a week. I didnt say a word about this, tucker, from the moment the story broke. Tucker i didnt either. Somebody about this stank from the moment it happened. I just stayed very quiet. I waited and i watched and i waited and i watched. And all the time more and more stuff came out from himim not releasing his phone to then releasing redacted records so on and so on. Slowly but surely the real story built up and this guy had completely invented the whole attack. He had staged it. He had wrote to his friends to do. This im sorry i have already seen on social media people starting to feel sorry for this guy. We should cut him some slack he has Mental Health issues. Thats always the first refuge of excuse for this kind of behavior. He is not mentally ill. He is greedy and he is somebody who was craving attention. And a lot of the media as i think is very apparent from the story a lot of the Mainstream Media in americahe have gone so full on antitrump that they were prepared to suspend all journalistic integrity and credibility in the way they reported this story by just believing every word this guy said. They did it, tucker, because were now in a culture where my truth is perceived to be the truth. And its not. Time and again now we see people where their truth, their idea of a truth is a complete lie. Jussie smollett claimed to have been effectively lynched. Everybody followed up with this all the democrats were tweeting, Kamala Harris to cory booker it was a lynching. They were trying to lynch this l guy. But it wasnt. The only thing that was lynched was the truth. Thats right. Tucker and the truth abetted it the channel you and i once worked at among them. Pierce morgan such a great summation as always. Thank you very much. Good to see you. Tucker we have got more on this story and be joined later in the show by dan bongino and Chadwick Moore for even more on why this happened. Why what it means and what happens next. Thats in just a bit. We live in the age of the woke billionaire but you you would live to see that we are seeing it why are the biggest winners in our Economic System endorsing socialism for america . Theres a reason for that we will tell what you it is after the break. You. All of you. How you live, what you love. Thats what inspired us to create americas most advanced internet. Internet that puts you in charge. That protects whats important. It handles everything, and reaches everywhere. This is beyond wifi, this is xfi. Simple. Easy. Awesome. Xfinity, the future of awesome. Tucker 2019 is only a couple months old. We havent given it a name yet so how about the year of the woke billionaire . Sit back and watch as the democratic president ial candidates simultaneously jockey to establish the most left wing possible credentials and very same time feverishly suck up to the super rich to fund their campaigns. Hl we havee seen some of this before tom styer and george soros obvious examples. There aree many, many, many more just this past saturday coming saturday senator cory booker attending a Silicon Valley fundraiser este louder fortune. Kamala harris had a fundraiser in Beverly Hills studio execs. Kristin gillibrand did not start her campaign before asking the permission of wall street. What else the message in rich people are highly progressive now and you can see why . Hee they love mass immigration. Brings them servants, they supporthe federally mandated. Abortion sacrament from them especially when practiced in poor neighborhoods. The confusing part. These are by definition affluent people and yet increasingly tax rates are rallying cry for the Democratic Party. Why are billionaires so eager to back candidates who want to seize their assets to fund new entitlements . This is confusing. Here is one reason. Billionaires understand they will never have to pay those taxes because the top federal income tax rate stops at about 500 grand. Why. Whats the difference someone making 500,000 a year and someone making 50 million ae year . The answer the rich every one can much more easily avoid paying full freight and they do. This group makes far more of their money on Capital Gains taxedal only half the rate of your salary some of it is not taxed at all. Under the 2017 tax law investments in federally designated Opportunity Zones evade callll at that point gains taxes entirely. One such Opportunity Zone by the way is right by the Army Navy Country club inrg virginia one of americas richest zip codes. Even on official tax returns. Even on income, the richest americans are paying less. According to theist, the top 1 of americans pay about 27 of their income in taxes. But the top tenth of 1 . Thats people who make 35 million a year pay less than 26 . And the top thousand of a percent absolute richest pay less than 24 . In other words, past a certain point the richer you are the less you pay. Thats why t billionaires back socialism. It doesnt cost them much. Dana perino hosts the Daily Briefing with dana perino. Also coming on later in the show on final exam with greg gutfeld. Tucker im rooting for you as you know. Thank you. Tucker dont tell him. Interesting dynamic where the Democratic Party is becomingra openly socialist but certainly embracing economic populism funded by the richest segmentment of our society. How does that work . It is interesting. To say have Bernie Sanders launch his campaign in the week after the basically another fellow democratic socialist chased amazon out of new york city put Bernie Sanders to the left of mayor de blasio and Governor Cuomo not easy to do it. Bernie has been a victim of his own success. He has won this war without even firing a shot. In 2016 he basically said this is going what im going to be for. He ran unabashedly on it and he had a lot of support. I think if democrats hadnt rigged their primary he might have actually been the nominee. Perhaps good for him that he wasnt because then he had times to let me ideas percolate if you think there had been alexandria ocasiocortez in 2019 if there had not been a Bernie Sanders in 2016. Tucker r good point. Absolutely not. Also, the other thing you have you have Democratic Candidates like Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren both taking great pains this week to say that they are not socialistseai they are capitalists and they have to explain it but tough ask yourself is it a distinction without a difference . If you are talking about free healthcare for all, free college for all unbashedly bashing the Financial Institutions and promising lots of things hithat are going to look like a socialist country. Thats why the democrats find themselves already in february of 2019 on the losing end of a debate with donald trump. Tucker are they were almost out of time im interested since you are steeped in the numbers. Are they going to lose that debate . They will lose it as far as im concerned. S is the public on the side of capitalism or socialism . Sincere question. Well, i actually think that karl rove has talked about this for a while and he is right. If younger people in america say that they are more aligned with socialism, we should take them seriously. Just this week tucker we found most people in america could not pass a basic citizenship test immigrants have to take in order to get a chance to live here in america. So we have a lot of making up to do. But i do think that the country is still a center right country but conservatives, capitalists, people who do not want socialism havee to try to make a very good case for it because Bernie Sanders has a Grassroots Organization across the country willing to send him 25 over and over and over again. That makes a big difference. They are not just going to big donors and billionaires to get funding even though they do t that, too. They have support all across the country and people should take that very haseriously. Tucker yeah. I couldnt agree more. Good. Tucker there is a reason people feel that way. Dana perino, great to see you as always and we will see you in just a minute. Okay. O tucker the Democratic Party is changing very fast as you know. We try to chronicle it on this show. They are for socialism. They are embracing reparations for slavery something people talk about on the fringes. No big candidate endorse it a bunch did in the last week. Thats next. Were the hayles, and were usaa members for life. Get your usaa Auto Insurance quote today. Chicken thats right, chicken . candace new chicken creations from starkist. Buffalo Style Chicken in a pouch bold choice, charlie just tear, eat. Mmmmm. And go try all of my chicken creations chicken tucker in a recent interview tucker in a recent interview Kamala Harris came up with new policy issues approve of reparations for slavery. We have got to address back a to the iniquity. There through look, america has a history of 200 years ofye slavery. People arent starting out on the same base. In terms of their ability to succeed and so we have got toe recognize that and give people a lift up. You are for some type of. Yes, i am. Tucker used to be eccentric opinion now lots of people have it just today senator Elizabeth Warren may be under the influence say she also supports reparations so did leon castro. Just two years ago keep in mind Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton were both asked about this and both said they opposed it. Five years ago tearing downn statues for taking that position thats where we are today. Mark steyn has been following this and joins us tonight. To seems like things are moving kind of fast, mark. Yeah, they are. And this is disturbing if reparations is becoming a mainstream position. Its particularly absurd, i think, for Elizabeth Warren to be in favor of that. This is someone who, in a sense, has benefited from a fake appropriation of racial grievance as you know the business about her being 1 1,024th native american presumably. And, yet, presenting herself as harvard law schools first woman of color. Thats what happens when you actually get into this sort of neo appar tight of racially classification. And i find it particularly absurd. I mean, when Kamala Harris says people are not starting from the same point slavery was abolished a century and a half ago. Nobody alive today has a grandparent who was a slave. And in that sense i think you reach a point where, you know, you need to move on. I mean, the reparations thing, eventually as the decades goes by becomes ridiculous, im canadian i think you should give us reparations if you hadnt had revolution the whole utcontinent would now be canada and if you were going to steal our land from us and driver the lawyerless out, tucker, you could have at least divided the continent east, west so us canadians werent hold up in the cold i think i would have the half without the california and president ial candidates in it. May be the bit in the middle and you guys can have the coast. But the point is, this is nothing real with experience this is nothing real to the lived experience of people of all kinds of identities today. And certainly not to Kamala Harris. Am shoe has a jamaican father and indian mother and i dont know whether its the identity politics as her father was suggesting earlier today, i dont know whether its this whole identity politics obsession that means she hasth to genuflect to this because her whole experience is entirely apart from the africanamerican slave experience. Tucker pe its also bad though. Its really divisive. Mark steyn great to see you. It is divisive. Tucker it is. Thanks a lot, tucker. Tucker time now for final exam. Two contestants create chaos on set during their last matchoff. We will face off again. Get ready for dana perino and greg gutfeld in this weeks news quiz. See if you can beat them. Well be right back. And save even more on a new one. Plus huge savings. Like 50 off spools of Berkley Trilene fluorocarbon line. Tucker time now for final exam where hardenedd news professionals have been see who is paying the most attention to whats happened over the last week. Error defending champion Lauren Blanchard is on assignment. So tonight we have a new york city special edition for you two long standing bitter rivals of many decades, dana perino and greg gutfeld cohost of the five join us tonight. Im glad you are here. Im glad to be here. Greg is so happy to be here. Eating ribs, tucker. Eating ribs and drinking wine and watching a rerun of friends. Tucker we are going to see if o that kind of preparation serves you well. I think its fair to ask our audience who has done more prep work for this segment. Yeah. Thats exactly right. So you know the rules. Im going to run through them super quick. Hands on buzzers. Ask the questions. The first one to buzz in gets to answer. You have to wait until i finish asking a question like alex drabek tucker you can answer once i say your name. Every correct answer gets you one point. If you lose a question, we detract a point. So you could actually get into negative territory pretty fast. Best of five wins. Make sense . Yes. Best of the five right here. R tucker the five. Question one. Here it is. If elected in november of 2020, Bernie Sanders would be the oldest president in american history. How old would he be on Inauguration Day . You came in early . 77. You are right, did i cheat. Tucker unfortunately i cant hear you. Can ii only hear my judges yelling in my ear it goes to greg. I would say 80 but i already won. 77. So greg gets to answer. You are saying 80, greg . A i already won. Im not answering. Imhe taking the fifth. Tucker no. You have to answer the question. Talk to my lawyer. [laughter] i already won. All right. 77. 77 all right. We will go to the tape. Is it 77 . He will be 79. Oh, no. You, that is so, no, no, no. We are not doing this anymore. She cheats. This happened last time. [buzzer] 77 now. Tucker you thought you were benefiting a from her premature buzz. That. Is a total set up. Last time she was reading off the teleprompter or was that judge jeanine . Tucker im pretty sure that was judge jeanine. I dont think anyone believes dana perino would do that. All right. Your questions are too long, tucker. Tucker this is even longer one. Er make surehoice you have heard all the options before you answer. So mad. 2020 hopeful Kirsten Gillibrand had a speech in iowa. En her speech was interrupted when a woman pushed passed her on a mission to find what condiment. Was it hot sauce. Ranch dressing or dana perinos famous questions so queso dan it is b ranch dressing. Is it b ranch dressing . To the tape we go . Grassroots care about. Sorry, im just going to get some ranch dressing. [laughter] dana just want some eranch, just like everybody. Tucker look at that. So easy no one is going to goo for danas queso. Tucker gillibrand campaign event. Question three, a democratic congressman became a bit of a laughing stock in Digital World yesterday on twitter. This congressman bragged to his followers that he walked an entire extra block to get his coffee. This was an effort to oboycott trump tower. Who was w it . Greg gutfeld . Swalwell. Eric swalwell. Im mocking his name. Tucker see if answer matches tape. Eric swalwell. Turned a trip to go to starbucks into a political statement tweeting this its snowing in new york. I y need coffee. The closest cafe is inside trump tower this is me walking to alternative. Tucker iv they are giving it to you even though you sound like the parents in a peanut cartoon. I was mocking his name. They are tryingtoa pease you. Tucker i dont think they are. I think you are back to zero. Congratulations. Story of my life. F tucker question four, if you looked up at the night sky this week. If you didnt live in new york city for example, you may have seen an interesting lunarer spectacle the winter moon appeared extra bright thousands of miles closer to to the earth closer than it is is there is a name for this event and hint is has something to do with winter weather. [laughter] if you were to look outside your apartment. I dont do that i usually sit in a dark room and listen to death metal. Wait, i saw the picture it was tweeted. Guess. It was picture. Guess. Dana . Not a harvest moon. Lunar moon. She said harvest moon she said its not a harvest moon. What is your answer . I said lunar moon doesnt make any sense. Lunar moon. That would be redundant but it might still be the answer will find out. A super snow moon. T. J. Is wrapped watching. This its called super t. J. Because the moon is at its closest to earth right now and its full and february is full moon is known as a snow moon because many associated the month with heavy snowfall. Dana got it. [buzzer] tucker statistician in control room saying this is the first ever zerozero final question. So you are going into sudden death with no points on the board. Dana sudden death might be his. Al tucker final question multiple choice have to wait until i finish asking it a statue of abraham lynn in a the california become unpopular online because of unusual depiction of our 16th president. What is so strange about this particular lincoln is it a . He is a young and shirtless . B, he is holding a kitten . C, he is on roller blades . Okay. Tucker you sound resigned. I have not seen this eestatue or anything he was a big Animal Rights activist actually for his time so im going to go with b holding a kitten. Tucker was Abraham Lincoln holding a kitten in the statuary hall. Reminder that the los angeles federal courthouse has a statue of Abraham Lincoln where is he a shirtless young stud suggestively tugging at his waistband like a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model. Abraham lincoln like you have never seen him before. [buzzer] i dont think i should ever be asked again. I won with a score of zero. Tucker lowest score ever recorded in. The history we. People and little scores. Tucker greg gutfeld you win with zero. Next time i see you i will award you our eric wemple victory mug. I cant give you gave him eric swalwell. Come on. You are going to talk about this for the end of time. Tucker that may be how its pronounced i dont know. Have you him on the show all the time. I watch your show. He is our next president. Tucker thank you, have you entered the history books. Thank you we are very honored. Thank you, tucker. If thats your real name. A tucker congratulations. Thats it for this weeks final exam if you can call it that. Pay attention to the news each week tune in thursday to see if you can beat our pros, hint, yes, you can well be right back. Absolut absolute justice would be an apology to this city that he smeared. Admitting what he did and then be man enough to offer what he should offer up in terms of all the resources that were put into this. Tucker so as journalists and politicians race to see who could say the most embarrassingly credulous things about Jussie Smollettsbo obvious hate hoax, the police did their jobs. They stayed calm, they made noal assumptions. They investigated it thoroughly and they discovered something shocking. And for thatom they are being attacked. Just moments ago, smolletts attorney released a statement saying, mr. Smollett is a young man of impeccable character and integrity who fiercely and solemnly maintains his innocence and feels betrayed by a system who wants to skip due process and proceed directly to sentencing. Dan bongino is a former officer with the nypd b and he joins us tonight. So dan, youve watched thiss from beginning until now and its still unfolding. What are the main conclusions you are drawing from what have you seen . Well, tucker, you know,l, its amazing we have spent all this money on this country on an Education System that claims to teach, you know, critical thinking, right . But if you thought critically about this case from the beginning, you would have never jumped to the conclusions. And, you know,it i spent a lot of time with the secret service and nypd but you dont have to be a Law Enforcement officer to have seen the red flags in the case, tucker. First, if you are attacked like this violently at night, who doesnt turn over their Police Records to immediately clear themselves and try to get the actual bad guy . It just didnt make sense. And that statement you just read, i mean, its outrageous. He is not entitled to due process . Tucker, he was given every single benefit by the media, by everyone else, benefits by the way, you and i would have been questioned about this vigorously from the beginning. Now is he claiming somehow that he is a martyr in this . Listen, of course you are presumed innocent. I get that. But thats a ridiculous statement to try to paint yourself as a martyr when you havent even cooperated with the police from the beginning. Its f absurd. Tucker at some point he is going to put the media in a pretty tough spot. If he continues to deny this and say that he is once again the victims of yet another persecution or whatever, i mean, can don lemon sit there and cnn and not defend him . You know, at some point when these kids on twitter they say you have got to take the l. At some point youoi have to take the loss. Tucker, its binary at this point, is it not . . They have these two brothers. These people that they are questioning. Apparently involved in this. They are either the attackers or they are not. If they are cooperating and they have been released, what does that say to you as someone who thinks in common sense terms . They are either the attackers or they have not. They have been released. Clearly, there is something. Wrong withng this case, and it appears that when you takear it all and look at it, that smollett is the guy who has not beenen clear, open, and honest here. Tucker i just dont understand how we are sort allieding over what this guy really did, which is use racialid stereotypes to attack fellow americans and no one is saying that. Im not really sure why. Right. Its not just that. He lied. Its that he took it to thet next level. He added a bunch of lets call them aggravating factors. They were wearing maga hats and they screamedd this is maga country and they put a noose one of the most abhorrent symbols of a troubled timeri in american history. All these aggravating things he threw on top, as if being attacked and claiming Trump Supporters wasnt bad enough, we have to put bleach and a noose and they screamed, its maga country. Really speaks to this didnt happen and this is all a hoax, a level of serious depravity. This guy needs some serious help. Tucker i want to super quick check on your sensibility about all of this. So you work in journalism. Robin roberts over at abc news works in journalism. She heard Jussie Smolletts story and she concluded it was beautiful. Was there ever a moment when you heard his story and you thought thats beautiful . No. I thought its questionable. Edt, Robin Roberts needed that story to be true and wanted it to be true. And its clear from the questioning. There was not one criticalon question asked of a guy with a very suspect story. Its a real shame and a stain on journalism. Tucker nicely put. Dan bongino, great to see you. Thank you. Good to see you too, tucker. See you next week. Tucker after his court hearing, Jussie Smollett returned to the show empire. He kept crew waiting 30 minutes in order to film his scene this was today. When he arrived, he begged the crew and fellow actors to believe him. To believe in his innocence, he said this, i would never dou this to any of you. You are my family. I swear to god i did not doid this. Well, the press didnt need that kind of begging to believe Jussie Smollett. Virtually everyone in the press is ready to believe him anyway. What we do know is that racism is alive and well in this country. There is real evidence of people who have done these things who cite that the president has inspired that. The fact that, reportedly said, this is maga country adds to sort of the atmosphere of menace that africanamericans in particular and people of color in general have felt since the advent of the trump administration. He said his attackers hurled racial and homophobic slurs at him. This is america in 2019. Tucker so there are a lot of dumb, credulous people in the media. Chadwick moore is not oneas of them. He was not fooled. He predicted the outcome in the smollett case more than two weeks ago. Dallas was attacked for it but deserves us now for a welldeserved i dont want to call it a victory lap, but you were right. Great to see you. You looked at this story. Looked at the facts and you didnt buy it. I didnt buy it from the first sentence of the first report that i read. And it wasnt even just maga country which made me laugh out loud and i think a lot of people because nobody what trump supporter would say that . Everyone knew that was fake. Tucker exactly. My first question when w w i read this story, i thought what was the weather last night in chicago . Looked it up and negative 20 with the wind chill. That was the first thing that tipped me off. Like, something isnt right here. That is the most simple question to ask. We expect our journalists to be able to that would be the most basic thing i wouldnd look up. None of them did it. And now what we see with the media is, they are legitimately gas lighting the American Public and saying no, no, we handled this very, very well. We were very fair. They are saying a lot of celebrities and activists on twitter ran with it and you are confusing us with them. No, you can certifiably look up the washington post, abc news, nbc news, the associated press, the guardian. Go on forever. They all ran with the story. They all never said alleged attack. They never said claims. They said he was definitively attacked. Now they are circling their wagons and now they are defending one another. I have never seen a journalist ever have true remorse, ever go through a period of or very rarely a period of selfreflection. And were not going to see it here. Brian stelter over at cnn is sort of leading the charge with this. Its about they are continuing to protect their own. Protect their industry. And they just simply do not care about the truth. They do not care about being anything but activists at this point. Tucker no. I think thats absolutely right. Whats interesting is that there doesnt seem to be any penalty in this deeply corrupt, deeply corrupt business of journalism for getting it wrong in one direction. If you had come out in public two weeks ago i had doubts myself about this story, seemed obviously like there were at least holes in it i was afraid to express those doubts in public. Its not worth it actually. Massive penalty for doubting this in public. Isnt our job supposed to be skepticism . Exactly. I sort of thought the same thing. Im wrong, this could really be a big hit to my career. I was just so convinced i wasnt. Nothing about it made sense. Meanwhile, at the time when a few brave people were actually expressing skepticism, they were called conspiracy theorists by the media. Al they were maligned and they were treated like kooks. Turns out they were right all along. And, you know, the media will just move on. Rethey dont care. They are really the propagators of all off this. Theyre the reason why Jussie Smollett felt like he could get away with this because he knew they would be on his side. Because they created this fake narrative of armies of racist Trump Supporters marching around and assaulting people. So why would he think that he wouldnt get away with it . Tucker thats a good point. D you, of all people know what its like to be inside journalism and take a view that is not considered acceptable. You came out in favor of donald trump and had people ursically try to destroy your life. Exactly. And, yeah, a lot of it happened. We just saw recently that reporter, i believe she is from cbs news who came out and tucker lara logan. Thats right. Another case recently soay weird to see this. Npr who did similar thing. Ormost like when these journalists actually seek out the truth and actually try to get to know these boogie men Trump Supporters they almost seem to always deflect afterwards and sort of fail to see the horrors that are happening in their industry. Journalists are they couldnt be more disconnected. I think the democrat politicians who ran with this story from day one are genuinely corrupt and they are smart enough to see the holes in it. Tucker thats for sure. The journalists who ran with it, some im sure, but i think it was mainly profound stupidity tucker thats not reassuring. You know what . All the smart kids go into finance. I dont think any are homegrown geniuses are rushing to the New York Times anymore. Great to seema you. Always a pleasure. Tucker thank you. Well, speaking of president ial candidates,s Kamala Harris has lost no time resorting to stereotypes to advance her cause. True. Recently bragged about smoking a ton of weed in college listening to tupac. Tupac not released any music at the time. When pressed about legalizing weed, come on, man, im jamaican. Im jamaican. One person didnt think was that funny was her own father, a stanford professor called donald harris. He released a statement condemning what his daughter said, my departed grandmother as well as my deceased parents utst be turning in their graves right now to see their familys name, reputation and proud jamaican identity connected in any way, jokingly or not, with the fraudulent stereotype of a potsmoking joy seeker and in the pursuit of identity politics. Speaking for myself and my immediate jamaican family, we wish to categorically disassociate ourselves from this tragedy. [laughs] its amazing. But it really shouldnt surprise you. She was trafficking in stereotypes. Completely. Notav every jamaican is dreadlocks and smokes weed all day and you have to be Kamala Harris to think heotherwise. Amazing. Thats it for us tonight. Good night from washington. Well be back tomorrow, 8 00 p. M. , the show that is the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness, and groupthink. Youre not going to believe what happens. Sean hannity right now sean that was really good. Great story. Great show. Welcome to hannity. Buckle up for another full night of breaking news alllc over the place. Coming up, caught on tape. Is this a trump supporter f actually being punched in the face . What could be a politically motivated hate crime . The person involved will tell their story in a few minutes. First, we begin in chicago once again and today after posting 100,000 bond, Jussie Smollett sprinted away from the media. The actor spent the