Fox News host Griff Jenkins fact-checked Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to his face after officials at the Department of Homeland Security alleged that 37-year-old slain nurse Alex Pretti was a domestic terrorist.
"Here's a quote from [Fox's] reporting saying there is extreme internal frustration with DHS officials going on television and putting out statements to describe Alex Pretti as a domestic terrorist who was there to inflict maximum damage on federal agents or conduct a massacre even after multiple videos emerged," Jenkins explained on Monday, "to show that these claims appear to be inaccurate."
"Some of these sources have described DHS's response to the shooting as a case study on how not to do crisis PR," he continued. "One said they're so fed up they wish they could retire."
"I ask you, based on the DOJ's purview, do the actions of Alex Pretti amount to domestic terrorism?"
Blanche dodged the question: "Look, it's an investigation. So I'm not going to prejudge what his actions were or were not."
The DOJ attorney went on to blame local officials in Minnesota as "the reason why that [shooting] happened on Saturday."
"With all due respect, sir, my question is more pointed," Jenkins pressed. "Do you believe your colleagues may have gone farther? You are an attorney at DOJ. 18 U.S. Code § 2331 has a legal definition of domestic terrorism. And it doesn't appear to most of the country that have watched the available video."
"But it does not appear to have met that definition of domestic terrorism," the Fox News host added. "So I'm just sort of wondering how you in the DOJ are viewing whether your colleagues may have gone too far."
"Look, I don't think anybody thinks that they were comparing what happened on Saturday to the legal definition of domestic terrorism," Blanche snapped. "So I'm not describing it as anything except for a tragedy, but I still, I do not think it is fair. It is not fair for the narrative to be around something DHS said. It is not fair for the narrative to be around what a video shows over 10 seconds."
