The panel on Morning Joe reacted with shock and despair at Donald Trump’s history-making election win Wednesday morning.
Coming on the air just moments after Trump’s second presidential term was confirmed, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough said: “This is the biggest red wave I’ve seen since Ronald Reagan’s 49-state victory in 1984.” He added that Trump won “in dominating fashion” and said America was waking up to “a Democratic Party that has been just wiped out this morning.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Co-host Jonathan Lemire was similarly awed by the result, saying Republicans had “steamrolled” the presidential race, additionally taking control of the Senate and potentially on their way to taking the House of Representatives too.
“He was impeached twice,” Lemire said of Trump. “He botched the handling of the pandemic. He faced four criminal cases. He inspired January 6th. And he won anyway. And now he will return to office with few guardrails internally, encouragement from Moscow and other foreign adversaries, and a Supreme Court that has said that his power is largely unchecked.”
Arguably the most lugubrious analysis came from Claire McCaskill, the former Democratic senator from Missouri.
“First I think we have to acknowledge that Donald Trump knows our country better than we do,” McCaskill said. “I think he figured out that anger and frankly fear were way more powerful than appealing to people’s better angels. That anger and fear were going to work in this election, whether you’re afraid of immigrants or afraid of people who are trans, he figured that out. And I think we all thought everyone’s better angels would prevail. Turns out the better angels went on vacation when Donald Trump came down the escalator and they haven’t returned.”
She also gave credit to Trump’s campaign managers, Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita.
“The majority of America believes he was persecuted, not prosecuted,” McCaskill said. “And there’s no question that our grip on, “Hey, we’ve got to make sure those same rules apply to everyone, we’ve got to make sure the rule of law applies to every American no matter who you are or how powerful you are…’ Turns out that’s not true. America believed—the majority of Americans believed—that he was a victim in those prosecutions, not a perpetrator.”
“His voters believe that he is a victim,” co-host Willie Geist said of Trump’s legal troubles. “And they believe that he carries their grievance with him and now back to the White House. “Whether it’s generals coming out calling him a fascist, whether it’s a long line of elites, celebrities coming out for Kamala Harris, a largely adversarial news media against Donald Trump—he withstood it all. And they didn’t like that. They didn’t like that it was him against the world.”
The Daily Beast Podcast episodes are released every Thursday. Like and download on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app. And click here for email updates as each new episode drops.
