Joe Rogan defended 2024 Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s comments about the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks during a podcast episode released Thursday, prompting Twitter owner Elon Musk to echo Rogan’s message the next day.
The Atlantic, like many publications, once wrote great material, but has now devolved into a tedious propaganda pusher.
They could at least not bore us all to death in the process!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 25, 2023
Rogan and guest Dave Smith agreed that Ramaswamy said “literally nothing wrong” as they reacted to a clip of CNN host and former Daily Caller reporter Kaitlan Collins talking about Ramaswamy’s remarks to The Atlantic.
In an interview with the outlet, Ramaswamy compared the importance of knowing whether federal agents were involved in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot to obtaining the same information about the 9/11 hijackings. When Collins accused him on Tuesday of promoting 9/11 conspiracy theories, Ramaswamy claimed The Atlantic had misquoted him. The outlet later released the interview audio, which showed that the quote was accurate.
“The truth is, he did say it, the quote was accurate and it is on tape,” Collins said in a segment after The Atlantic released the audio.
“I think it’s legitimate to say, ‘How many police, how many federal agents were on the planes that hit the Twin Towers?'” Ramaswamy told the outlet in the interview. “Like, I think we want — maybe the answer is zero, probably is zero for all I know, right? I have no reason to think it was anything other than zero. But if we’re doing a comprehensive assessment of what happened on 9/11, we have a 9/11 commission, absolutely that should be an answer the public knows the answer to.”
Rogan argued on his show that Collins took Ramaswamy’s comments “out of context” and noted that The Atlantic did not release the entire recording. (RELATED: ‘Our Government Repeatedly Lies To Us’: Vivek Ramaswamy Pushes Back At Mike Pence Over 9/11 Jab)
“We’re doing this in comparison to Jan. 6. So we do want to know how many federal agents were involved in Jan. 6. And imagine if there were actually federal agents on the planes of 9/11. He didn’t say there were,” Rogan said.
Ramaswamy later quote tweeted the clip of Rogan and Smith responding to Collins’ analysis of his remarks.
“The anatomy of a mainstream media smear, cooked up by the @TheAtlantic and amplified by @CNN. Good for @joerogan explaining how this goes down. The reality is it happens daily,” Ramaswamy wrote.
Elon Musk also defended Ramaswamy in a reply to the candidate’s post.
“The Atlantic, like many publications, once wrote great material, but now has devolved into a tedious propaganda pusher,” Musk wrote. “They could at least not bore us all to death in the process!”
Ramaswamy set a new personal fundraising record Friday following the first GOP presidential debate.