Conservative podcaster Benny Johnson says he is considering legal action against The New York Times over what he calls a "sloppy hit job" that downplayed the dangers his wife and newborn child faced when a rowhouse that shared a wall with his home was set ablaze in Washington, D.C.
The 2020 fire killed two dogs and security camera footage shows police officers using a crowbar to pry open Johnson's front door before his wife exits while holding a baby as black smoke pours out. New York Times reporter Ken Bensinger penned an Aug. 30 story headlined, "He Plagiarized and Promoted Falsehoods. The White House Embraces Him," that implied the influencer embellished what his family experienced.
"Absolutely, we are looking into [legal action]. It's something that has caused an enormous amount of pain to my family. Why bring this back up? Why force my wife to relive this? It was the worst day of our lives," Johnson told Fox News Digital.
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"The entire article and my entire engagement with this reporter for The New York Times was him saying that effectively, 'We don't deserve sympathy for having our house damaged in a horrible fire [where] there's a video of my home with flames and black smoke in my child's nursery,'" Johnson continued. "It's a real lack of humanity that's demonstrated on the left, and they really need to fix that."
The fire was raised when Johnson, a pro-Trump pundit who has 3.8 million followers on X, attended an Aug. 12 press briefing about the administration cracking down on crime in the nation's capital.
"As a D.C. resident of 15 years, I lived on Capitol Hill. I witnessed so many muggings and so much theft, I've lost track," Johnson told press secretary Karoline Leavitt. "I was carjacked. I have murders on my Ring camera and mass shootings. I witnessed a woman on my block get held up at gunpoint for $20, and my house was set ablaze in an arson with my infant child inside."
Johnson believes the Times worked to discredit his claims. The paper reported that "police records show nobody has been murdered since at least 2017 on the block where Mr. Johnson lived in Washington. And his home was not burned, though his next-door neighbor's house was 'intentionally set' on fire, according to the city's fire department."
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Johnson told Fox News Digital that the Times failed to add critical facts and context related to both the fire and murder he mentioned at the press briefing.
"For those who are unfamiliar with the rowhouse model, these are homes that share walls. This is what I find particularly insulting. They leave that out of the article. This is like saying that the room connected to your child's nursery was set ablaze. It shares a wall with your child," Johnson said.
"So, it's a room in your house. It's on fire. But then The New York Times says your child isn't in danger even though the room next to him or her is ablaze and dogs are being burned alive in it," Johnson continued. "That's what The New York Times decided to say about my fire."
Johnson said he provided the Times with photos and videos that should have left "no ambiguity" about what happened.
"The entire breakdown was framed under the suspicion that, 'We can't prove anything,' but we did prove something, and in spite of all that, they still wrote that the police report doesn't show that we were in danger," Johnson said, adding that police reports typically give broad overviews.
In a YouTube video posted Aug. 6, Johnson said his family "nearly died" in the incident and his home was "burned to the ground," remarks Bensinger disputed in his Times report.
Johnson also said he was living in the rowhouse when he witnessed the murder in 2017 and called the article a "sloppy hit job."
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Johnson posted a text message exchange with Bensinger on X.
"DC fire records show that the Oct. 25, 2020, arson was actually in your next door neighbor's house and was contained there. No humans were injured (although two dogs were killed). You have stated that your wife and child's lives were put at risk and nearly died. That cannot be confirmed or denied based on police and fire reports, which make no mention of neighbors being at risk," Bensinger wrote in a message to Johnson.
Johnson wrote, "Here is Ken's direct text message to me declaring I could not 'confirm' my family was in danger in spite of police video evidence and the dogs being BURNED ALIVE."
Bensinger responded on X: "The angle was decidedly not there is no proof his child was in danger. It was that he lied about it being 'burned to the ground.' The house wasn't set on fire & did not burn."
"Johnson says the article targets his wife & children. Untrue. It's about him and his history with veracity; they are scarcely mentioned. The article does state 'security footage viewed by The Times shows Mr. Johnson's wife and a child being escorted out of their house, but no people were injured,'" Bensinger continued.
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"It was the NYT that dug up the police & fire reports that show he was not telling the truth when he claimed in public multiple times that (a) his house burned to the ground and (b) that there were murders on his front lawn," Bensinger added. "There were no murders on his entire block, although there was a shooting that the police report shows wounded three but killed nobody. The fire report shows his house was not burned because it was contained to the neighboring house."
Bensinger referred Fox News Digital to the newspaper's media relations team when asked for comment.
The New York Times said in a statement that the report was not about Johnson's family and not an attempt to diminish safety concerns.
"This was a detailed report about his journalistic dishonesty that refutes, with facts, the many falsehoods he continues to share seemingly to promote the president's federalization of Washington's law enforcement. These falsehoods include the claim that a lethal shooting happened on his block, which is disputed by police records, and that his own home 'was burned to the ground,' which is disputed by the video showing the door of an adjoining home as smoke billows from the property," a Times spokesperson told Fox News Digital.
Johnson, who relocated to Florida after the fire, said the next steps are up to his lawyer.
"However, on a moral level, it is disgraceful," Johnson said. "I'm fighting for decency here."
