Sean Penn Shuts Down Hannity With 10-Word Taliban Response

Hollywood star Sean Penn confronted Fox News host Sean Hannity during a passionate discussion about U.S. intervention in global conflicts with a 10-word response about the Taliban.

Penn sat down with the Fox News host for an interview earlier this week, billed as a "Hannity Special," where they spoke on a range of topics, including the war in Ukraine and Donald Trump's foreign policy.

The pair entered into a heated discussion about Trump's foreign policy, with Penn attacking him and Hannity praising the former president's handling of ISIS.

Referring to ISIS' significant territorial losses during the Trump presidency, Hannity said: "When Trump took out the caliphate, he wiped them to smithereens.

"The caliphate all through the Obama-Biden years, grew, grew, grew, grew, grew, territory, territory and he wiped them out one by one."

In response, Penn said: "Is this when he invited the Taliban to Camp David?"

The director's comment refers to a planned peace negotiation meeting with the Taliban which aimed to end the war in Afghanistan.

In a September 7, 2019, X, formerly known as Twitter, post Trump confirmed the planned meeting, but he ultimately canceled it.

Trump said: "Unbeknownst to almost everyone, the major Taliban leaders and, separately, the president of Afghanistan, were going to secretly meet with me at Camp David on Sunday. They were coming to the United States tonight. Unfortunately, in order to build false leverage, they admitted to an attack in Kabul that killed one of our great, great soldiers, and 11 other people. I immediately canceled the meeting and called off peace negotiations. What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position? They didn't, they only made it worse!"

Penn's response drew some praise online with President Joe Biden supporter Victor Shi posting on X: "Damn. Sean Penn wrecked Sean Hannity last night. Hannity claimed Trump 'took on the Caliphate and wiped them to smithereens' and Sean Penn responded, 'Is this when he invited the Taliban to Camp David?' Sean Penn is so good & a national treasure. Watch this."

The clip, which ends when Penn asks the question, went viral after being posted to X by account Acyn on Saturday, September 23, and has been viewed more than 500,000 times.

California Rep. Eric Swalwell, who shared the same 18-second clip," also praised Penn adding: "In 10 words, Sean Penn destroys @seanhannity."

His comment was viewed more than 753,700 times and received 20,800 likes on X.

But the brief 18-second clip omitted much of the two-part discussion between Penn and Hannity which aired earlier this week.

In the special, Hannity asked Penn about his feature Superpower, which profiles Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, before it moved on to the director's views on Trump foreign policies.

During the second part of the interview, Penn expressed his negative view of Trump's leadership and its impact across the world.

Hannity returned to Trump's actions regarding ISIS and compared it to what he viewed as a poor response from European nations and the administration of Biden when it came to supporting Ukraine.

The response to Penn was less enthusiastic and in many instances largely negative in the comment section under the videos for both interviews that were shared by the Fox News YouTube channel.

Newsweek has contacted Penn's representatives for comment via email.

While ISIS grew to its maximum extent during the presidency of Barack Obama, the terrorist state also began its decline during the Democrat's last term in office.

However, it was not until 2019, during the Trump presidency, when most of its territory was lost and self-declared caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed during a U.S. Joint Special Operations Command mission in October 2019.