The legacy Sunday shows appear to have taken a collective vow of omertà regarding coverage of what would have been treated as an immediate disqualifier had a Republican done something similar. The hosts of these shows shut out any discussion of Democrat Virginia Attorney General candidate Jay Jones as he fantasized about murdering a political opponent and his family in a series of text messages.
For context and an idea of what was omitted from the Sunday shows, watch coverage of the scandal as aired on Fox News Live on Saturday, October 4th, 2025:
MIKE EMANUEL: Disturbing developments in Virginia's attorney general race as the Democratic nominee Jay Jones is apologizing for text messages obtained by Fox News where he spoke about violent fantasies against then-Virginia Speaker Republican Todd Gilbert. Madison Scarpino is live with this story. Hi, Madison.
MADISON SCARPINO: Hi, Mike. Jones is running to be Virginia's chief legal officer, but his resurfaced text messages from 2022 are alarming people on both sides of the aisle. So to give viewers some background: a Virginia delegate had just passed away and people were pouring in tributes, including then-Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert. Well, that led to the attorney general candidate Jones texting Republican Delegate Carri Coyner, saying some pretty foul things about Gilbert. So here are just some of the texts. You can see Coyner tries to stop Jones from what he's saying and he goes on to say, quote: “three people, two bullets.Gilbert, Hitler and Pol Pot. Gilbert gets two bullets to the head. Spoiler: put Gilbert in the crew with the two worst people you know and he receives both bullets every time.” After all this came to light yesterday, Coyner tells Fox what Jones said was not just disturbing, but also disqualifying for anyone who wants to seek public office. But he’s not dropping out of the race as of now. In a statement, Jones says in part, quote: “I take full responsibility for my actions and I want to issue my deepest apology to Speaker Gilbert and his family. Reading back those words made me sick to my stomach. I am embarrassed, ashamed, and sorry.” Virginia Delegate Geary Higgins says that he was shocked to see all of this. He's been a victim of politically-charged death threats himself, and says Jones' behavior is completely unacceptable.
GEARY HIGGINS: He needs to step down and go get himself straightened out because this is just not- not acceptable in a civilized society.
SCARPINO: And now the Democrat nominee for the Virginia governor's race is Abigail Spanberger and she says that she spoke frankly with Jones about her disgust over those text messages, but she has not yet called for him to drop out of the race. Mike.
EMANUEL: Considering political violence in recent months and years…
SCARPINO: Yeah.
EMANUEL: …a very disturbing story. Madison, thanks very much.
SCARPINO: Thanks, Mike.
These texts cannot be viewed in isolation, but must be considered within the ongoing cycle of leftwing violence besieging the country. Inasmuch as the Virginia off-year election is always treated as a bellwether for the subsequent midterms and the legacy media’s Sunday political shows are all set in Washington, D.C., it is inexcusable that the texts would go uncovered. They would certainly not, had a Republican said similar things about a Democrat opponent. Under such circumstances, the legacies would go into stratospheric dudgeon.
Instead, and as also was the case for Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s stalker/assassin getting a slap on the wrist from a Biden judge once he came out as transgender, there was nary a peep from the media. “Silence is complicity”, said the left quite often during the racially-tinged protests of the Summer of Love. Well, the same principle applies.
The Sunday hosts did their best to contain the Jay Jones scandal, and largely succeeded, with the notable exception of Kristen Welker on NBC’s Meet the Press. During the panel discussion on the shutdown, former Chief of Staff to Vice President Mike Pence Marc Short let loose, eliciting one of the more disgusting responses you’ll hear from a DC Democrat:
Consider where we are: on Meet the Depressed, former Pence CoS @marctshort calls out national Dem silence over VA AG candidate Jay Jones' disgusting, violent texts fantasizing about the murder of a political opponent and his family. Kristen Welker flips the hot potato over to… pic.twitter.com/C6LD1kgNNV
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) October 5, 2025
MARC SHORT: But can I also say in your interview with Leader Jeffries, that can we stop with the pearl clutching about the mean tweets and sombrero tweets? That this week it came to light that a Democratic candidate for Attorney General of the State of Virginia called for the assassination of a political opponent, called for the assassination of that political opponent's family, and there's not one national Democrat calling for him to step aside. Not one. It's disgraceful.
KRISTEN WELKER: Neera, let me let you respond to that because that is going to be a big story, I think, in the coming days. Then we go to Andrea.
NEERA TANDEN: I mean, I absolutely think that people should criticize that, 100%. I think it was a private conversation he had, but still awful and disgusting. Wasn’t calling for it in public, but terrible…
WELKER: It should be condemned.
TANDEN: It should be- it should be condemned. But then, we should condemn that, but then you should condemn when the president calls the Democratic Party “the party of Satan.”
SHORT: Yeah, in all fairness…
TANDEN: Why don't we just say both of those things are (unint)…
SHORT: I think- I think I’ve paid the price for speaking out about political violence on our side…
TANDEN: Yeah, I agree with that…but criticize the Republicans for the president, for saying Satan.
SHORT: I think I clearly have. But the fact that not one Democrat has (unint) when he called for political assassination in this moment of political violence is crazy.
Leave it to Autopen Neera Tanden to scrape the bottom of the barrel at all times, especially within this season of political violence. She did so with no pushback from Welker, who predicts this will be a big story in the coming days. We’ll see. IN the meantime, remember: silence is complicity.