Aaron Rodgers has found an ally in Stephen A. Smith. Smith openly questioned a story generated by CNN alleging the New York Jets quarterback believed that the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012 didn’t take place.
Bounding Into Sports reported on CNN’s claims that Rodgers, while attending the Kentucky Derby in 2013, had told a CNN reporter that the Sandy Hook shooting “was actually a government inside job and the media was intentionally ignoring it.”
The authors of that report, Pamela Brown and Jake Tapper, referred to Rodgers as “deranged” and cited two sources – one of whom is Brown – to suggest he had espoused wild conspiracy theories around the shooting. While at the Kentucky Derby. 11 years ago.
The Sandy Hook shooting occurred in Newtown, Connecticut. It involved a 20-year-old gunman who killed 20 first-graders and six school employees before taking his own life. It is considered one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history.
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There were numerous people skeptical of the CNN story. Most questioned the timing as Aaron Rodgers had just been rumored to be on the shortlist to join Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential ticket.
The media loves portraying Kennedy as a conspiracy theorist loon. As they do with Rodgers. So manufacturing outrage is consistent, especially at the network in question.
ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith joined those who wondered if CNN simply went fishing for a story and this is what they came up with.
“Now for me, in interest of fairness, I would ask this of the CNN reporter and CNN as a network; why are we hearing about this just now if this is what transpired in 2013?” Smith said on his podcast.
“How is that happening? If you’re in the news business, how is something relevant 12 years later when you never mentioned it 12 years ago?”
In his commentary, Smith notes that if – IF – what is being said of Aaron Rodgers is true, then it is despicable. But he still finds it hard to believe.
And he challenges CNN to present actual evidence.
“I understand that Aaron Rodgers may be a VP running mate of RFK Jr., but he isn’t yet,” he continued. “And if he isn’t yet then what would be the reason for bringing this up now? And if you’re going to bring this up now where is the evidence? Because I got news for you!”
Smith believes the “burden is on CNN” and Brown to present the evidence.
“I just find it very difficult to believe that Aaron Rodgers would do something like that,” he said. “Not the Aaron Rogers I’ve spoken to periodically over the years. I don’t see that.”
“Now the onus is on CNN to show us proof since you put that story out for the world to see. Period.”
RELATED: Jets’ Aaron Rodgers On RFK Jr.’s List For VP
Rodgers Refutes CNN’s Report
Stephen A. Smith hasn’t exactly been a blindly staunch defender of Aaron Rodgers either. In 2021, he described the NFL quarterback as “a liar” and demanded he be suspended for having tested positive for COVID.
Rodgers had played coy about his vaccine status, as most Americans did at the time, because NFL officials and the public, in general, were trying to shame people into getting the jab against their will.
Aaron Rodgers has denied the CNN report.
“As I’m on the record saying in the past, what happened in Sandy Hook was an absolute tragedy. I am not and have never been of the opinion that the events did not take place,” Rodgers said in a statement posted to social media.
And would you look at that? He is, in fact, on record, saying something completely contrary to what CNN is peddling.
Here is Aaron Rodgers on local news shortly after the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012 talking about the tragedy.
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) March 14, 2024
I'm gonna guess that CNN's "trust me bro" sources may not have been entirely accurate about this one. https://t.co/twVA6fr9PB pic.twitter.com/H6zdQkBan2
“I hope that we can learn from this, and look for the signs more, and not ever have something like this happen and keep this on our minds,” Rodgers said during a newscast in 2012.
“These are things that affect all of us directly or indirectly. This needs to be something that we learn from.”
That doesn’t sound like a guy who thought the shooting was staged by the government.
CNN’s response to news that RFK was considering Rodgers as a running mate is another example that the mainstream media has pivoted from actually covering news, and instead turned into a political hitjob machine.
In all likelihood, they won’t present the evidence. They won’t update their story. They’ll just let it linger in the hopes that it destroys Rodgers’ reputation.
