John joins us now! https://t.co/uHal53Jqoy https://t.co/mH18jYWRY8
— Kirk and Callahan (@KirkAndCallahan) February 14, 2017
In recent years, right-wing talk show host John Ziegler has emerged as Jerry Sandusky’s most prominent defender. According to Ziegler, every single one of Sandusky’s victims is lying. With news that Sandusky’s son, Jeffrey, has been arrested on child sexual abuse charges, Ziegler came on Kirk & Callahan Tuesday to talk about the case.
According to prosecutors, Jeffrey Sandusky, who’s one of the disgraced ex-Penn State defensive coordinator’s six adopted children, tried to solicit his two teenage stepdaughters for oral sex and naked pictures. Sandusky allegedly asked his older daughter for a blowjob in 2013 when she was 15 years old, and her younger sister last year to send him pictures of herself changing and urinating. She was 16 at the time.
Though Ziegler says the criminal report report looks bad, he’s unwilling to say Sandusky is guilty. Instead, Ziegler says there’s a possibility he was set up.
“Put yourself in the position of a father whose ex-wife is dating a Sandusky in 2013-2016. You want that guy out of your life,” he said. “You want this entire situation out of your life. If Jeff did something really stupid, and maybe even wrong and maybe even highly inappropriate –– and who knows –– maybe even criminal [crosstalk]. … Those three people clearly have a huge incentive to get Jeff Sandusky out of their life.”
Ziegler went on to say Dottie Sandusky, Jeffrey’s mother and Jerry’s wife, thinks her son is innocent. He says he told her Jeffrey is going to jail, even though he doubts the older daughter’s account of events.
“After reading the complaint about the 15-year-old daughter –– I don’t believe that, because that happened in 2013 and that sounds to me like a sister trying to help another sister out along with a dad to try to substantiate and exaggerate a story,” he said.
Given the mountain of evidence against Jeffrey Sandusky, it’s difficult for Ziegler to dismiss the charges outright. But he says it lends further credence to his theory about Jerry Sandusky’s innocence, because no text messages or recorded conversations have been brought forward in his cases.
“Why is there evidence against Jeffrey Sandusky that does not remotely exist against Jerry, despite the fact that Jerry has been investigated for eight years with unlimited resources by multiple authorities?,” he said. “There’s no evidence when there should be mountains of evidence.”
In a lot of ways, Ziegler says the Penn State sexual assault story is analogous to Deflategate. According to him, false reporting from ESPN ignited the scandal, much like Chris Mortensen’s fabricated report about the Patriots’ footballs air pressure levels propelled Deflategate to the front-page.
“As far as Deflategate is concerned, the whole Deflategate thing starts because ESPN files a false report –– Chris Mortensen with the 11 out of 12 balls being deflated. And that gets [treated as] gospel, and sparks a domino affect and everyone gets invested in a mythology,” he said. “Well, that’s exactly what happened with the [Mike] McQueary episode in the Penn State case. There was a false report, mostly by ESPN at the start of this story and everything comes downhill from there. Everyone is invested in mythology. It’s the Lock Ness Monster story.”
