Ken Jennings finally apologizes for those past insensitive tweets

Ken Jennings isn’t scheduled to make his first official Jeopardy! appearance as interim host until January 11, but he’s already in the hot seat after some of his old social media posts resurfaced (again). While the most prominent tweet was called out pretty widely back in 2018, the soon-to-be-host is finally addressing the criticism head on.

“Hey, I just wanted to own up to the fact that over the years on Twitter, I've definitely tweeted some unartful and insensitive things,” Jennings wrote on December 30. “Sometimes they worked as jokes in my head and I was dismayed to see how they read on screen. In the past, I'd usually leave bad tweets up just so they could be dunked on. At least that way they could lead to smart replies and even advocacy. Deleting them felt like whitewashing a mistake.”

Jennings addressed the issue after an insensitive tweet from 2014 resurfaced again after he was announced as interim Jeopardy! host. In the tweet (which has now been deleted after six years), the Jeopardy GOAT winner wrote, “Nothing sadder than a hot person in a wheelchair.” Meanwhile in the U.S., Republicans were also taking him to task for a post he shared in June. “To all the conservatives who found out today that Tom Morello or Jim Gaffigan don’t share their politics: it’ll be easier to get this done all at once,” he wrote. “NOBODY whose work you like shares your politics. You get Kelsey Grammer and that’s it.”

While Jennings appears to have no issue with the latter tweet (he has posted a few follow-ups since), he does appear to feel bad about the former. “[I] may have given the impression I stand by every failed joke I've ever posted here. Not at all!” he continued in the thread. “Sometimes I said dumb things in a dumb way and I want to apologize to people who were (rightfully!) offended. It wasn't my intention to hurt anyone, but that doesn't matter: I screwed up, and I'm truly sorry.”

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Following the apology, some fans seemed to stand by Jennings, but others accused him of trying to rehabilitate his image ahead of his Jeopardy! premiere. It’s also worth noting his other new game show, The Chase, debuts on January 7. The ABC remake of the British quiz show stars Jennings and fellow Jeopardy! champs Brad Rutter and James Holzhauer. In each episode the trio attempt to out-answer everyday contestants who are competing for a cash prize.

However you may feel about Jennings, his interim replacement gig is coming up quickly. The week of January 4 marks the final week of taped episodes hosted by Alex Trebek, who lost his battle with pancreatic cancer at the beginning of November. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly the show’s executive producer, Mike Richards, recently revealed the final five episodes are some of Trebek’s most memorable.

“Those final five episodes, we shot three the first day and then two the second day, and they were great. You'll watch them and you'll go, ‘This guy's as healthy as could be. This is not a sick person at all.’ He had that much willpower,” Richards told the publication. “And we knew how much he was fighting, and that's what made the performance even more impressive.”

Richards also revealed that after what wound up being Trebek’s final day of taping he went up to the legendary host and told him those shows were the most incredible thing he’d ever seen. “He did not like to be complimented. That was kind of staring down the mouth of a great white when you'd do that, because he really didn't like that,” Richards recalled. “But I had to say it, because it was the most incredible thing I'd ever seen. And he was exhausted, obviously, and he looks up and he goes, ‘Thank you.’ He knew what he had done and appreciated the fact that we all knew what he had done. So those last two days are very special, and I'll never forget them.”

It’s probably safe to say that fans won’t forget them anytime soon either. 

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