Fox News and radio host Sean Hannity brought up murdered Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich, a month after saying on his TV show he wouldn’t bring up the subject anymore.
Hannity mentioned Rich again on his radio show, resurrecting a conspiracy theory he’d previously pushed that Rich, who was shot and killed in July 2016 in Washington D.C., had been murdered as part of a cover-up by Democrats.
As The Hill reports, Hannity mentioned Rich while talking about DNC emails that were sent to WikiLeaks, showing that DNC leaders tried to undermine Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign. Hannity suggested those leaks came from lower-level staffers who weren’t happy about how the DNC was treating Sanders. Hannity then linked the theoretical leakers to Rich.
“Now I don’t know anything about Seth Rich in this sense. I don’t have any information about why he was murdered except that it was suspicious,” Hannity said. “And suspicious meaning it wasn’t a robbery as they’ve claimed but otherwise why would you not steal his wallet, his phone, his necklace, his jewelry and watch and everything else.”
Hannity said on his Fox News show on May 23 that he would stop talking about Rich’s murder and the conspiracy theory surrounding it after Rich’s parents publicly and repeatedly asked him to stop politicizing their son’s death. Backlash against Hannity for continuing to bring up the Rich conspiracy theory even cost his show advertisers. Police ruled Rich’s death a botched robbery, and his killer has not been found.
Hannity pushed the theory that Rich was murdered for attempting to leak DNC information to WikiLeaks. That theory originated with a Fox News report on May 16, which was later retracted after it came out that the source Fox relied on to say there was evidence of Rich attempting to contact WikiLeaks revealed that that suggestion came from Fox itself.
“Out of respect for the family’s wishes, I am not discussing this matter at this time,” Hannity said on May 23.