The circus was in full swing on CNN this Monday as tensions boiled over during a panel discussion about the legacy of January 6, 2021, and the state of the nation under outgoing President Joe Biden. Republican contributor Scott Jennings found himself in the crosshairs of host Kate Bolduan, who ultimately told him to “zip it” after a spirited exchange about inflation, public perception, and Biden’s record.
The drama kicked off when Bolduan raised a loaded question, setting the stage for fireworks. “You can play all the soundbites from the days after [January 6] when you heard Republicans blaming Donald Trump… Four years later, we are here,” she remarked, asking Jennings whether Trump’s resurgence was due to how he or the Democrats handled the fallout from that day.
Jennings, unflinching, delivered a pointed response. “The big message is that in the United States, the people decide. And because of the disastrous four years that came after Donald Trump, the people decided to return Donald Trump to power,” he said, hitting a nerve.
He went on to highlight the electorate’s verdict on the Biden administration. “They looked at what happened on January the 6th, they looked at all the things Democrats claimed about Donald Trump, and they analyzed every single decision Joe Biden and Kamala Harris made. The result? A convincing four years for Donald Trump.”
Bolduan, clearly displeased, attempted to pivot the conversation back to January 6, claiming it was “tough” to celebrate the democratic process given the events of that day. Jennings refused to let the narrative slide, framing voters’ decisions as a referendum on the past four years rather than the Capitol breach.
The real fireworks began when panelist Bakari Sellers chimed in, trying to defend Biden’s record by asserting, “Donald Trump is inheriting one of the best economies… net migration at the border is lower than before Trump took office.” Jennings countered, “The American people soundly rejected that argument,” sparking a contentious back-and-forth.
Sellers then made the dubious claim that “prices are going down,” which Jennings quickly dismantled. “They’re not. Inflation is still going up,” he shot back. Sellers, undeterred, insisted otherwise without offering evidence, leading to an increasingly chaotic exchange.
Bolduan attempted to mediate but ended up fueling the tension. “It is decreasing in rate,” she said, referring to inflation, but Jennings wasn’t buying it. “Are prices going down or not?” he pressed. The host, visibly frustrated, snapped, “They are down from their sky-high rates, yes. Stop! Let’s move on.”
As Jennings tried to clarify, Bolduan erupted with the now-infamous “Zip it!” retort, silencing the discussion and cementing the segment as yet another example of mainstream media’s struggle to handle dissenting viewpoints.
Jennings summed up the fiasco perfectly: “You’re trying to paint a picture of a country that doesn’t exist!” Indeed, many viewers couldn’t help but agree. If anything, the segment highlighted why millions of Americans are tuning out legacy media’s increasingly unhinged narratives—and why they’re turning to voices that don’t shout them down for speaking the truth.
