CNN anchor Abby Phillip wasn’t having it Monday night when MAGA commentator Scott Jennings decided to mock Muslim religious garb on live television.
The Republican strategist compared Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan wearing a hijab to “The Handmaid’s Tale”—you know, the dystopian series about women being forced into sexual slavery. Totally reasonable comparison, right?
WHAT’S GOING ON: Flanagan briefly wore a headscarf while visiting a Somali-owned mall in Minneapolis, in what her spokesperson told the New York Post was done “out of respect.” This apparently sent Republicans into a tailspin, with House Majority Whip Tom Emmer calling it a “stunt.” Enter Jennings, who took the criticism straight into Islamophobic territory.
“They got the lieutenant governor up there dressed like The Handmaid’s Tale,” Jennings said on CNN NewsNight, comparing a religious head covering worn by millions of Muslim women worldwide to the red cloaks and white bonnets worn by fictional rape victims.
Phillip shut him down immediately, pointing out he wouldn’t dare make similar comments about “Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn” and accusing him of using a pop-culture reference to “denigrate the religion of a group of people.”
“So don’t. Just don’t do it,” she snapped.
THE DETAILS: The panel discussion centered on a fraud investigation involving federal funds at Minnesota childcare centers. Federal prosecutors filed charges in the “Feeding Our Future” case back in September 2022, alleging a $250 million scheme exploiting a federally funded child nutrition program.
Republicans have seized on the case, while Democrats argue the renewed focus is being weaponized amid Trump’s immigration crackdown and his administration’s hostility toward Somali communities in Minneapolis.
WHY IT MATTERS: Jennings has built a career spouting right-wing talking points on CNN, but equating Islamic religious practice with fictional oppression isn’t political commentary—it’s bigotry dressed up as punditry.
When a CNN host has to stop a segment to remind a panelist not to mock an entire religion on air, something has gone seriously wrong with our discourse. (OF COURSE, this is the same network that keeps booking him despite repeated incidents.)
The fact that Jennings felt comfortable making this comparison speaks volumes about how normalized anti-Muslim rhetoric has become in MAGA circles—and how desperately TV news needs to stop treating it as just another “perspective” worth debating.