MSNBC’s Morning Joe crew on Monday reacted with horror to Donald Trump’s decision to pick Kash Patel to lead the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The choice of Patel, a lawyer who served in several roles in the president-elect’s first administration, set off a firestorm of criticism in part because of his promotion of conspiracy theories and calls for retribution against Trump’s opponents in a second term. To underscore the point, Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough repeatedly asked for a clip to be replayed on his show Monday in which Patel spoke about his intention to “come after” Trump’s enemies.
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“We’ve got to put in all-American patriots top to bottom,” Patel says in the footage taken from a 2023 interview with Steve Bannon, Trump’s former adviser. Patel later adds: “We will go out and find the conspirators not just in government, but in the media. Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections.”
“We’re going to come after you,” Patel continues. “Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out. But yeah, we’re putting you all on notice.”
After the footage aired for the first time on Morning Joe, co-host Mika Brzezinski tried to introduce a guest for reaction when Scarborough interrupted.
“Hold on a second,” he said. “Could you play that again? Can we do a CC to Republican Senators?” Hey, Mitch McConnell and Chuck Grassley. Let’s see… Mike Rounds is a great patriot, deeply disturbed by this. He said pretty much just that. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, who certainly stood up to the atrocious selection of Matt Gaetz [as attorney general]. We want to play this one again.”
After playing the clip a second time, Scarborough asked for it to be aired again.
“I’d love to also play this one more time for all those Wall Street billionaires who say: ‘Oh, come on, come on. This is just all about tax guys, he’s not going to get people who prosecute,’” Scarborough said, adding that he also wanted to play it again for Trump “apologists who have said that: ‘Oh, oh, Kash Patel would never get put in that position.”
He went on to say he wasn’t advising senators to “uniformly vote no against everybody that Donald Trump puts up” for his new administration, saying that Marco Rubio—Trump’s nominee for secretary of state—is someone who “knows the issues, who works with people on both sides who may be an effective Secretary of state.”
“Same thing with the treasury director,” Scarborough said referring to Scott Bessent, the hedge fund veteran Trump has picked for Treasury secretary. “But not this. Play it again.”
After the clip rolled for the third time, Scarborough said choosing Patel would be bad for everyone.
“This is not only bad for the men and women who run the FBI,” he said. “This is not only bad for the rule of law. This is not only bad for the First Amendment. This is not only bad for the United States of America. This is bad for Donald Trump. This is bad for the Trump administration.”
“This is not going to end well,” Scarborough continued. “So I think the best case scenario for everybody is that Kash Patel—and this talk of Kash Patel—ends like the Matt Gaetz’s nomination ended because this will not go well for anybody.”
After being chosen to become Trump’s attorney general, Gaetz eventually withdrew himself from consideration for the job amid relentless scrutiny on allegations of wrongdoing—including sex with a minor and drug use—which Gaetz has consistently denied. Reports claimed that Gaetz withdrew after Trump spoke with him about concerns that they wouldn’t get the Senate votes needed to confirm him as AG.
“I still believe there will be four Republican senators who will not vote to confirm somebody who says he’s going to throw judges in jail,” Scarborough said of Patel. “He’s going to throw bureaucrats in jail. He’s going to throw reporters in jail who did not go along with the 2020 ‘Stop the Steal’ conspiracy theory.”
Scarborough and Brzezinski, who have been deeply critical of Trump since his first administration, recently faced an uproar of their own over a meeting with Trump at Mar-a-Lago. They said the purpose of the personal visit was to “restart communications” with the president-elect.
The Morning Joe clip of Patel’s 2023 interview with Bannon did not include part of the conversation in which Bannon said: “I want the Morning Joe producers that watch us, and all the producers that watch us—this is just not rhetoric. We’re absolutely dead serious.”
