Oklahoma’s House Speaker gave an explanation for why images of a nude woman appeared on state Superintendent Ryan Walters' office TV last week during an Oklahoma State Board of Education executive session.
Walters, a Republican who has mandated that Bibles be available in school classrooms, is currently under investigation by a pair of law enforcement agencies over the incident.
According to the state's Speaker of the House, Kyle Hilbert, the situation was a "bizarre accident." Hilbert is also a Republican.
On Tuesday, Hilbert held a press briefing and said that Walters had recently installed a Samsung TV that automatically plays Samsung's TV Plus Channel 1204 — which is titled "Movie Hub Action" — when it is powered on.
He said that when the TV was turned on, it was showing clips of the 1985 film The Protector followed by the 2017 film The Foreigner. The former movie was reportedly playing and showed images of a naked woman during the meeting, according to the Oklahoma Voice.
Scenes from The Protector reportedly match the images that were seen on the TV during the meeting.
Board members Becky Carson and Ryan Deatherage filed a complaint about the situation after noting the images on the television.
“I saw them just walking across the screen, and I’m like, ‘no.’ I’m sorry I even have to use this language, but I’m like, ‘Those are her nipples.’ And then I’m like, ‘That’s pubic hair.’...I was so disturbed by it…I was very stern, like I’d been a mother or a classroom teacher. And I said, ‘What am I watching? Turn it off now!’” Carson told The Oklahoman at the time.
Walters initially tried to pass off the situation as a set-up by Governor Kevin Stitt, whose appointees made the initial claims of explicit images on Walters' computer.
His comms team made a similar defense to The Oklahoman.
"Any number of people have access to these offices. You have a hostile board who will say and do anything except tell the truth, and now, the Wokelahoman is reporting on an alleged random TV cable image," a Walters spokesperson said.
After the incident, Hilbert and the Office of Management and Enterprise investigated and called Samsung to determine what film was playing at the time Walters turned on his television.
Hilbert said the display of images was not Walters' fault, but rather just a fluke of how the television operates. He also said Walters' allegations that it was a planned attack by the state's governor were "highly unlikely."
“In my opinion, the most plausible explanation for what occurred that day is that the television, which had only been in the superintendent’s office for fewer than two months, automatically launched Samsung’s free streaming service and began playing a film that contained explicit content, without anyone in the room realizing it at the time,” Hilbert said.
He determined that his findings "vindicate both the state superintendent as well as the two board members."
The situation is still being investigated by both the Oklahoma County Sheriff's Office and the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
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