Sarah Wasko / Media Matters
In August of 2016, Sean Hannity on his radio show said “it would be reckless and irresponsible to suggest the Clintons or the DNC had anything to do with” the murder of Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich. Since then, however, Hannity has been the most prominent driver of conspiracy theories that suggest just that.
During the August 10 edition of his radio show, Hannity brought up the fringe theories surrounding Rich’s death but repeatedly stated that he wasn’t “insinuating” Hillary Clinton or the DNC were complicit, and to do so would be “irresponsible”:
- Hannity: “By the way, I’ll say up front, am I insinuating in any way, shape, matter, or form that Hillary Clinton or the Clinton campaign or the DNC is responsible? No.”
- And: “I don’t want to get too deep into conspiracy theories.”
- And finally: “It would be reckless and irresponsible to suggest the Clintons or the DNC had anything to do with it.”
However, since then, of course, Hannity has dropped all pretense and pushed the conspiracy theory, insinuating exactly what he said would be “reckless and irresponsible" to insinuate.
After a week of intense backlash to his recent promotion of the discredited Seth Rich conspiracies, advertisers began to back away from his Fox News show, and Hannity went on vacation.
Before he left, one of his last public acts was to brag that “there’s nothing that I did, nothing that I said, except they don’t like my position politically,” in reference to criticism of his obsession with Rich.
Click here to listen to the full exchange from Hannity's August 10 radio show.