Spencer Pratt, the reality TV star turned Los Angeles mayoral hopeful, found himself under intense scrutiny from CNN’s Jake Tapper this week.
During an episode of The Lead on Thursday, Tapper confronted Pratt about comments he had made in a 2009 appearance on InfoWars, a show hosted by Alex Jones.
At that time, Pratt, known for his role on The Hills, expressed certainty that the 9/11 terrorist attacks were orchestrated from within, stating he was “100 percent” sure of this claim.
In the recent interview, Tapper played the old clip and directly challenged Pratt by asking, “Do you still believe that 9/11 was an inside job?”
Before giving a straightforward response, Pratt elaborated that his perspective has evolved significantly over the past 15 years, especially following the loss of his home in the Palisades fire last year.
“The truth is, those in power often let us down as taxpayers,” Pratt remarked to Tapper.
He added that he has ’20 years of regret’ but that his past comments don’t ‘connect’ to his ‘mission’ for Los Angeles.
‘And when you’re listening to that audio, that’s a 21, 22-year-old person,’ he said.
Jake Tapper relentlessly questioned LA’s top Republican mayoral candidate, former Hills star Spencer Pratt, about comments he made during a 2009 InfoWars appearance on Thursday’s edition of The Lead.
‘I’m now 42 and have experienced city negligence, state negligence, and I’ve learned a lot about it.’
Pratt maintained such behavior was ‘actually worse than a conspiracy.’
‘It’s that we have people in charge that make mistakes that get people killed.
‘So unfortunately, you know, I was young and naive to understanding how there are people that will fail citizens across the board.
‘I would have to go back and look at all that,’ he continued. ‘I haven’t watched any of those things in 20 years, or whatever.’
Tapper appeared to squint at points as Pratt continued to explain – without quite giving a definitive rebuttal of his previous comments.
The candidate went on to insist that the September 11, 2001, terror attacks were more likely the result of government failures rather than elaborate schemes.
‘I believe a lot of people failed to [not] allow the al Qaeda terrorists to get in,’ Pratt said. ‘So I think the negligence in government allowed [it] – not on purpose, but just failures.’
Pratt sat through the clip of him calling into a the now-defunct show to tell host Alex Jones he was ‘100 percent’ sure the 9/11 terrorist attacks were an ‘inside-job’
Pratt, in a tweet later that day, hailed Jones as ‘an American Hero’. In another tweet that year, he praised a documentary series that Jones produced
Tapper then brought up a 2009 tweet where Pratt praised a conspiracy-filled documentary that Jones executive produced.
Pratt also hailed Jones as ‘an American hero’ in another 2009 tweet that was not mentioned.
He made another InfoWars appearance in 2017, well after Jones made his infamous claim that the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting that killed 26 never happened and was a ruse designed to attack the Second Amendment.
InfoWars aired its final broadcast earlier this month as a result, after failing to pay damages to the Sandy Hook shooting victims’ families following a defamation lawsuit.
‘Now with new, fresh eyes, I’m sure I would look at that a lot different,’ Pratt said.
A poll last week from Emerson College showed the political newcomer climbing to just points behind current Mayor Karen Bass, despite originally entering as an underdog.
A 2-point jump from March put him in second place, over Councilmember Nithya Raman.
