On Wednesday's Morning Joe, the crew fulminated over the deletion of text messages by the Secret Service from the January 6th period. Scarborough insisted the deletions were an intentional, malicious, cover-up, due to Trump's politicization of the Secret Service. But what stood out was Scarborough flinging the word "fascist" to describe Trump 12 times, especially the "fascist takeover" planned for the day of riots.
Scarborough engaged in a favorite liberal exercise: angrily calling out Biden's Attorney Merrick Garland for not being partisan enough. Bellowing, "hey, Merrick!," he demanded that Garland charge Trump's "lackeys" in the Secret Service with perjury, convict them, and have them "thrown in jail."
When an image of Trump appeared on-screen at the end of the segment, an enraged Scarborough exploded:
"There's the fascist, by the way, there's the fascist who tried to overthrow American democracy . . . He's sitting around, eating, getting fatter, flying around on jets, going to country clubs, playing golf."
MSNBC Republican Elise Jordan suggested you can't rule out government bungling, that "this is just idiocracy that a couple of days after something as huge as January 6th, that they go ahead with this planned migration. And it really just seems like utter stupidity and the incompetence of a government bureaucracy. "
Scarborough couldn't accept that line: "I just don't believe it's not malicious. It is malicious. Nobody's that stupid, not even bureaucrats that are the worst of the worst are that stupid."
Scarborough then added something strange, saying that the people Trump set up to riot on January 6th are sitting in jail because they believed the "fascist lies" of "the Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker of our time."
We get that Scarborough sees Trump as Jim Bakker, the televangelist and convicted huckster. But who is the Tammy Faye in Scarborough's mind? Is Joe accusing Melania of being a criminal? Or Ivanka, perhaps? Scarborough shouldn't float such an ambiguous accusation of criminality--he owes an explanation.
If you want to talk about a married couple of flim-flam artists getting rich off exploiting a credulous audience of supporters, maybe it might look more like Joe and Mika. After all this base-arousing talk of "fascist takeovers," they can weekend in Nantucket.
On Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough accusing the Secret Service of intentionally, maliciously, deleting text messages from the January 6th period, and demanding that AG Garland prosecute Trump's "lackeys" in the Secret Service, was sponsored in part by Discover, AT&T, and DirecTV.
Here's the transcript.
MSNBC
Morning Joe
7/20/22
6:07 am EDTJOE SCARBOROUGH: They destroyed the records of, of, of, the, the people who work for the United States government, that was around the guy that was running a fascist takeover of the United States government, to get their text messages, to get the information on the inside. What was going on, while this fascist attempt to overthrow American democracy was playing out . . . This is -- this is just, on its face, it's, it's bad faith. And I can't believe, if they're ignoring a request from Congress, I can't believe, if they're destroying documents, despite what an inspector general is asking, that there aren't criminal charges attached to this.
ELISE JORDAN: Joe, I'm just not going to dismiss [out of] at hand, though, the possibility that the government is just completely broken, and can't do anything right here. You look at just how bumbling an idiot -- you know, this is just idiocracy that a couple of days after something as huge as January 5th, that they go ahead with this planned migration.
And it really just seems like utter stupidity and the incompetence of a government bureaucracy.
. . .
SCARBOROUGH: On January 6th, Donald Trump attempted a fascist takeover of American democracy. On January 6th, Secret Service members were ordered by him to go up to the Capitol, so he could take part in a fascist takeover of American democracy.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Where violence was under way.
. . .
SCARBOROUGH: And now, of course, the Trumpers who, who, that he put in place in the Secret Service, to politicize the Secret Service, as the Washington Post's Carol Leonnig reports all the time, now they're denying it. I mean, they've lied about so many other things in the past with Donald Trump, so, everybody knows they're lying. But now we're supposed to think, would we have text messages that would back this up from the Secret Service. We're supposed to think it was just a bureaucratic snafu. No, sorry, it doesn't work that way.
. . .
It's like the days after Pearl Harbor. The people running radar are burning all their documents.
MIKA: Right.
SCARBOROUGH: At the base there. No! Nobody would believe that was a bureaucratic snafu. It was the destruction of documents that could help us better understand what unfolded as a president, who had been defeated at the polls, was attempting a fascist takeover of American democracy.
. . .
You know, Mika, I just don't believe it's not malicious. It is malicious. Nobody's that stupid, not even bureaucrats that are the worst of the worst are that stupid. And especially when --
MIKA: I think more will come out.
SCARBOROUGH: Especially when you have books that have been written about how Donald Trump politicized the Secret Service.
. . .
Hey Merrick wake up! Merrick Garland, wake up! Wake up! Hey, Merrick, wake up! Investigate this cover-up! Let me put it in stark terms for you, in case you're afraid to break Marquis of Queensbury rules in boxing.
There was an attempted fascist overthrow of American democracy. The people the taxpayers pay to protect the presidency—not Donald Trump, but the presidency—they destroyed text messages that would have taken us to the heart of the fascist conspiracy to overthrow American democracy.
This isn't a normal day at the office, Merrick. This isn't a normal day at the office for, for, for the head of the DHS. This is a cover-up of a fascist takeover of American democracy. That failed.
. . .
If, if, if, if Trump's lackeys inside the Secret Service keep lying, they need to be, they, they need to be charged with perjury, they need to be convicted, they need to be thrown in jail, if they're not going to help Americans get to the bottom of this fascist overthrow of American democracy that failed—it's ridiculous.
MIKA: Coming up on Morning Joe, we have much more related to the January 6th investigation, including what we can expect --
SCARBOROUGH: [As image of Trump appears on the screen] And there's the fascist, by the way, there's the fascist who tried to overthrow American democracy.
MIKA: And doesn't care who loses their job.
SCARBOROUGH: And doesn't care who lives, doesn't care who dies. It's the guy who set people up to go riot on January the 6th, and he's sitting around, eating, getting fatter, flying around on jets, going to country clubs, playing golf, while working-class Americans who believed his lie. The Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker of our time, who believed his lie. They're sitting in jail now, because they believed his fascist lies.
