Ken Jennings on Why Facts Still Matter on “Jeopardy!”
The Political Scene | The New Yorker
The New Yorker
4.2 • 3.3K Ratings
🗓️ 26 November 2025
⏱️ 47 minutes
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Summary
The “Jeopardy!” host and former contestant Ken Jennings joins Tyler Foggatt to talk about America’s favorite game show. The wide-ranging conversation took place before a live audience onstage at the annual New Yorker Festival, on October 25th. Jennings discussed his historic seventy-four-game winning streak, how contestants’ game strategies have changed over the years, his relationship with the former longtime host Alex Trebek, and why a political career was not for him.
Related reading:
- “Ken Jennings Has Some Questions About Death,” by Sarah Larson
- “The Rare Authority of Alex Trebek,” by Doreen St. Félix
- “The Hidden Depths of Alex Trebek’s Banter with ‘Jeopardy!’ Contestants,” by Beth Blum
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| 0:00.0 | Hi everyone. I'm thrilled to be on stage this morning with the unbelievably impressive Ken Jennings. |
| 0:08.0 | There are many adjectives I could use, but impressive is what I went with. |
| 0:12.0 | That works for anybody. You can get a war criminal up here and say, wow, it's really... |
| 0:17.0 | It's really impressive what he pulled off. |
| 0:28.3 | That's, of course, Jeopardy legend Ken Jennings. |
| 0:33.1 | Ken grew up watching the syndicated version of Jeopardy, hosted by Alex Trebek. |
| 0:37.8 | But when that show debuted in 1984, Ken was actually living in South Korea. |
| 0:43.3 | His dad was an international lawyer who moved the family to Seoul when Ken was in first grade. |
| 0:48.0 | And so Ken was watching Jeopardy on the only English-language TV channel available to him, |
| 0:50.1 | which was the Armed Forces Korea Network. |
| 0:59.6 | In 2004, when Ken was living in the States again and working as a software engineer, he fulfilled his lifelong dream of competing on Jeopardy, and he was historically good. |
| 1:04.3 | He won a record 74 games in a row, earning more than $2.5 million. |
| 1:19.6 | And for many years, he was America's highest earning game show contestant, with various Jeopardy tournaments and other quiz shows bringing his total earnings to a whopping $5,796,214. The New York Times described Ken back in 2004 as a throwback to the days when ordinary people got on television for doing well, not something |
| 1:24.6 | shameless. He's been described by other publications as America's Hardest Working Nerd and the Seabiscuit |
| 1:30.7 | of Geekdom. |
| 1:32.2 | In 2020, he won the greatest of all time tournament on Jeopardy, cementing his status as the |
| 1:36.9 | goat. |
| 1:37.8 | And then, of course, he succeeded Alex Trebek as the host of Jeopardy just a few years ago. |
| 1:44.5 | I got the chance to speak with Ken live on stage at this year's New Yorker Festival, |
| 1:48.7 | and we're sharing the conversation today so that listeners can get a peek behind the curtain |
| 1:52.3 | of one of the all-time great game shows, Jeopardy. |
| 1:56.2 | I'm Tyler Foggett, and this is the political scene. Thank you so much, Tyler. |
... |
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