Megyn Kelly warned the Cornell case spiraled into Tish James territory
The Cornell 7 case already had more twists than a mountain back road.
Megyn Kelly thought she’d seen them all.
And Kelly just spotted one twist she thinks could tip the scales for Tish James.
Megyn Kelly Says the Cornell Story Took a Hard Turn Nobody Saw Coming
SiriusXM host Megyn Kelly brought on Rich Lowry and Charles CW Cooke of National Review to talk through the Cornell 7 mess, and she came to the microphone loaded for bear.
The background is ugly enough on its own. A Cornell student known in the case only as Jane Doe says a group of young men had sex with her against her will.
Cornell expelled two of the accused students, Matt Ingles and John Newell. No jury has convicted any of the men, and every accusation in this story remains exactly that, an accusation.
Many see it as “MeToo” run amok.
But Kelly flagged something important before she ever got to the headline-grabbing part. She pointed out that the four-man account isn’t the version Jane Doe has given from day one.
“Now it’s not what she was always saying,” Kelly said.
That’s a detail plenty of reporters would bury in paragraph twenty. Kelly put it right up front, which tells you she isn’t treating this as a simple morality play with an obvious ending. Jane Doe’s case keeps moving forward anyway.
One Accused Student Turned Up Halfway Around the World
Then came the part that set the internet buzzing.
Kelly gave credit to someone online who did the legwork of tracking down who Matt Ingles really is. She said the Daily Mail picked up that thread and ran with it.
According to that reporting, Ingles didn’t start life as Matt. Kelly said his original name is Umar and that he comes from the United Arab Emirates.
And the Daily Mail reports he has gone back home to Dubai.
Kelly said she went digging to see whether the United States could get him back if it ever came to that. “I looked it up to see if they have an extradition treaty with the United States, and they don’t,” she said.
“So Matt Ingles is out of here,” Kelly added.
Now, hold on a second. Nothing in Kelly’s remarks says a prosecutor has filed criminal charges against Ingles, so the extradition talk may be running a lap ahead of the facts. But the fact that a seasoned former prosecutor-watcher like Kelly went looking at all tells you how fast this case is moving, and how many people suspect the full story hasn’t come out yet.
Tish James and the Identity Politics Scorecard
Here’s where Kelly went somewhere most of the press corps wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole.
She ran through the backgrounds of the four accused men as she understood them. By her count, the group includes a Muslim, a black kid, an Asian, and a young man she believed came from a Portuguese background.
And Kelly drew a line straight from that list to Tish James.
“So you got four guys who fit squarely within Tish James’s identity politics, which will elevate them in the world of Tish James over a white young woman from the deep South who uses terms like ‘y’all’ regularly,” Kelly said.
She didn’t stop there. “I do actually think this could tip the balance in the minds of somebody like Tish James,” Kelly added.
Kelly even poked fun at herself a little, conceding the new details mattered for more than “throwing Muslims into the mix for no reason.” That’s the kind of self-aware aside you don’t hear on cable news panels where everyone reads from the same approved script.
Why Kelly’s Theory Hits a Nerve With Fed-Up Americans
Kelly’s argument rests on something millions of Americans have watched play out for a decade.
The woke left runs a scorecard. It sorts people into oppressors and the oppressed by checking boxes on race, religion, sex, and background. Evidence comes second, if it comes at all.
Under that scorecard, a white young woman from the South starts near the bottom of the pile. It doesn’t matter what she says happened to her. Her skin color and her accent already did the talking.
But Kelly’s theory still needs one more piece before it locks into place. The clip never spells out what role, if any, Tish James plays in the Cornell matter right now. Kelly talked about how “somebody like Tish James” might view the case. That’s a read on a mindset, not a report of something James has done.
Still, the mindset isn’t hard to find. Left-wing campuses built entire bureaucracies around DEI and identity politics, and those offices teach young people that guilt and innocence come color-coded. Activists cheered when that thinking crept into prosecutors’ offices and courtrooms across the country.
And the people who pay the price rarely live in Manhattan penthouses. They’re kids from small towns who walk onto elite campuses believing the rules apply the same way to everybody.
Equal justice under law means something simple. The accused get due process. The accuser gets a fair hearing. Nobody’s race, religion, or hometown moves the needle one inch in either direction.
But that’s precisely the principle the identity-politics crowd traded away when it decided some groups deserve a thumb on the scale. Kelly’s point lands because she’s asking whether that thumb will press down here, too, just pointed in a direction its fans never expected to defend.
There’s an irony buried in all of this. The same activists who demand that every accuser be believed may suddenly discover a deep passion for skepticism once the accused men check the right boxes. Watch for it.
And watch for the opposite reflex as well. Jane Doe’s shifting account deserves honest scrutiny, the same scrutiny any account gets in a fair system. If her story falls apart, it should fall apart on the facts. If it holds, it should hold on the facts. Identity shouldn’t decide either outcome.
The Cornell 7 case has a long way to go. One accused student reportedly sits in Dubai. Another left campus with an expulsion on his record. Jane Doe keeps pressing forward.
Kelly summed up the whole thing in five words. “This is getting very interesting.”
Source: RealClearPolitics, “Megyn Kelly: Cornell Defendants ‘Fit Squarely Within Tish James’s Identity Politics'” (Daily Mail reporting as cited by Megyn Kelly)
