‘Candace Is Brilliant’: Megyn Kelly Backs Up Candace Owens in War Over Charlie Kirk’s Views on Israel

Megyn Kelly backed up Candace Owens‘s commentary about Charlie Kirk’s allegedly evolving views on Israel in the wake of his assassination on her show Tuesday, at one point characterizing Owens as “brilliant.”

In the week since Kirk’s murder, Owens has attacked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for sharing a line from a letter Kirk addressed to him, insinuated that Netanyahu’s invitation to Kirk to visit Israel was a thinly-veiled threat, accused Bill Ackman of threatening Kirk, and instructed her followers to “Be very wary and suspicious of the people who are already telling us to stop asking questions about the Charlie Kirk assassination.”

“Candace, who’s been critical of Israel in this conflict, did not appreciate that we had a foreign leader reading part of Charlie’s letter, trying to characterize his stance on Israel without giving its full measure, because it had changed a bit in recent months. And she is not wrong about that,” began Kelly at the outset of a long monologue introducing the topic to Matt Welch, Kmele Foster, and Michael Moynihan, the hosts of The Fifth Column podcast.

Kelly went on to detail the debate Owens had ignited — as well as play a clip of Kirk’s appearance on her show last month. During Kelly and Kirk’s conversation, the pair had expressed frustration over criticism they had weathered from pro-Israel advocates.

“I want to verify that he was feeling frustrated, and he was feeling pressured, and he feeling like his character was being assassinated by people publicly and privately who are-, I guess, consider themselves more pro-Israel than Charlie. And he refused to back off of his criticisms and said there the truth, which is, in his case and in mine, the more you tell us we can’t talk about something the way we wanna talk about it, the more we’re likely to do it,” said Kelly.

When Moynihan got an opportunity to respond, he argued that “Candace Owens is a very, very dodgy witness in this considering she doesn’t have a ton of credibility amongst almost-”

“Okay, but wait. Let me just say-, let me say this in Candace’s defense,” interrupted Kelly. “First of all, she’s brilliant. Candace is brilliant. I realize she’s controversial, but she is very smart. She’s too smart to f around and say that she’s got like, the letter.”

As evidence, Kelly cited a tweet from Owens asserting that she had proof of “these people” making demands of Kirk.

After Moynihan briefly regained the floor and made note of Owens’s peddling of various conspiracy theories, Kelly interjected again and told viewers that they could go check out Owens’s series on Brigitte Macron, in which she suggests the French First Lady was born a man.

“You don’t have to trust her. If Candace is not your cup of tea, that’s fine,” Kelly reassured Moynihan. “You know, I’m not everybody’s cup of tea, she’s not everybody’s cup of tea. But I just played you a four-minute exchange of Charlie saying–”

Moynihan cut her off to observe that “Charlie Kirk says something that is very different than what Candace Owens feels about this stuff.”

“He says during that conversation with you that he is a stalwart Zionist. He doesn’t like people questioning his commitment to that idea,” he said. “But you know, I wonder why, you know, before Charlie Kirk had been buried, the number of people that were talking about Israel. That’s the thing that concerns me about why this is coming up. Why is it about the pet issue that she’s been talking about, I think, obsessively, for every time I tune in to like-, in these totally crazy ways.”

Kelly went on to dismiss the conspiracy theory that Israel “had a hand” in Kirk’s assassination, which Owens has arguably implied, but also made a point of saying she is not outright backing.

“I will say though, my own takeaway from this is Israel needs to wrap up this war. And I know they have hostages who are still in the hands of Hamas, but Ben Shapiro and I talked about this at length when he was on. They-, he said they made a mistake from the beginning in saying they’re not going to stop until every hostage is out. And that may not be possible and it can’t go on forever,” concluded Kelly. “And honestly, it’s because I do support Israel that I really would like to see them end this, even without the perfect resolution, which would be getting all the hostages back. They’re just losing too much support. They’re-, America starting to turn on them. And that cannot happen. That just cannot happen.”

On Tuesday, Andrew Kolvet, the executive producer of Kirk’s show, debunked Owens’s claims about Ackman in a tweet that read:

“FWIW, I spoke to all three team members, not counting security, who were with him, because I wanted to make sure one person hadn’t missed the alleged incident, etc.,” added Kolvet.

Kirk’s pastor, Rob McCoy, also directly rebuked Owens for her behavior in a statement.

“Charlie Kirk was my friend and I was his pastor. I want to simply say this regarding Candace Owens: Charlie Kirk was a friend to Candace and never publicly spoke poorly of her though he disagreed with her. He never operated nor entertained gossip or innuendo concerning Candace,” wrote McCoy. “My only comment I offer regarding Candace is this: I only wish at this tragic time of mourning she would be the friend to Charlie that he was to her. He would never have treated Candace or her family in such a way had God forbid this tragedy been hers.”

“’A friend loves at all times…’” he added, citing Proverbs 17:17.

The post ‘Candace Is Brilliant’: Megyn Kelly Backs Up Candace Owens in War Over Charlie Kirk’s Views on Israel first appeared on Mediaite.