CNN anchor Pamela Brown said Tuesday that New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers’ conspiratorial mindset was on display long before he made waves as a vaccine skeptic during the COVID pandemic.
Rodgers has been criticized for suggesting last week that ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel was closely linked to Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased sex trafficker. After Kimmel excoriated “tin foil hatter” Rodgers for the insinuation, Rodgers refused to apologize in an appearance Monday on ESPN’s The Pat McAfee Show—even though McAfee himself and ESPN have done so.
On CNN’s The Lead Tuesday, Brown spoke with CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy, who recounted the quarterback’s appearance yesterday, in which he continued to push conspiracies surrounding vaccines.
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Rodgers is “dragging [Disney] through the mud” as a result of his comments, Darcy said, referring to the parent company of both ESPN and ABC.
Brown then recalled a prior interaction she had had with Rodgers when he was with the Green Bay Packers.
“I remember it was, I think, like nine years ago that I met him, and he knew I was a CNN reporter, and he was spewing a very disturbing, debunked conspiracy theory to me,” said Brown, who opted to not go into detail.
“And that was many years ago, and clearly he just continues with that mindset. So, anytime you have Aaron Rodgers on, you’ve got to be ready to fact-check, apparently.”
Darcy said that McAfee “didn’t do a good job” of that earlier in the day.
