MSNBC political analyst Anand Giridharadas called out his colleague Chris Matthews live on-air Sunday morning after the longtime MSNBC host likened Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ strong Nevada showing to France falling to the Nazis in World War II.
As early results from Saturday’s Nevada caucuses showed Sanders held a massive lead and was primed for a huge victory, a deflated Matthews—who has been increasingly unhinged over the prospect of a Sanders nomination—made an eye-popping analogy about the Vermont senator’s frontrunner status.
“I’m reading last night about the fall of France in the summer of 1940. And the general calls up Churchill and says, ‘It’s over,’” the Hardball host declared. “And Churchill says, ‘How can it be? You got the greatest army in Europe. How can it be over?’ He said, ‘It’s over.’”
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Appearing on MSNBC’s AM Joy, Giridharadas was asked by host Joy Reid—herself a fervent Sanders critic—about a recent piece he wrote criticizing former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s campaign and his insistence he’ll be incorruptible due to his billionaire status, noting it is the same argument Donald Trump made last election.
Giridharadas, meanwhile, stated that we are currently seeing a “wake-up moment for the American power establishment” that Sanders has tapped into, adding that many establishment figures are reacting to the prospect of a Sanders nomination “like out of touch aristocrats in a dying aristocracy.”
Calling this a “moment of curiosity,” Giridharadas went on to say that while he loved the network he works at, he wonders why it is constantly allowing tech lobbyists to appear as pundits “explaining a political revolution to us.”
“Why is Chris Matthews on this air talking about the victory [of] Bernie Sanders, who had kin murdered in the Holocaust, analogizing it to the Nazi conquest of France?” Giridharadas exclaimed.
“People stuck in an old way of thinking, in 20th-century thinking are missing what is going on. It is time for all of us to step up, rethink the dawn of what may be, frankly, a new era in American life,” he added.
Reid, for her part, defended Matthews, saying she didn’t think he was “trying to make an anti-Jewish disparagement” but instead was speaking to the “cultural revulsion” of socialism many in his generation have.
Matthews’ latest remarks have led to progressives calling on MSNBC to fire the veteran host. The Hardball anchor isn’t the only one who has found himself in hot water over his anti-Bernie rhetoric. MSNBC contributor Jason Johnson faced swift and loud backlash after he dismissed the “island of misfit black girls” who supported Sanders.
After Giridharadas’ segment began to make waves on social media, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)—a passionate supporter of Sanders—took to Twitter to praise the MSNBC analyst while adding: “Mass movements are beginning to transform our political landscape in a way we haven’t seen in a long time.”
