On Thursday’s Morning Joe, while going over some of the latest approval polls regarding President Trump, host Joe Scarborough and frequent guest Mark Halperin were both elated over the idea of Trump working more with Democrats in recent weeks. However, Scarborough also went on a series of ugly rants about how several prominent conservatives, including Representative Steve King, Ann Coulter, and Sean Hannity, were “far, far, far right” agitators and even claimed that Coulter said that the President “should be killed.”
It all started out so tame:
SCARBOROUGH: Coming up, his talks with the Democrats, President Trump seeing some improvement in the latest round of polling. A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released this morning shows that Donald Trump’s overall approval rating at [sic] 43%. That's three points higher than it was in August. 52% of Americans disapprove with the president's job rating. The numbers identical to Politico/Morning Consult poll and Monmouth University’s latest polling finds the President with a net negative rating in single digits: 40% approve, 49% disapprove. NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll also found that 71% of Americans support President Trump’s recent deal with Democratic leaders to provide hurricane relief and keep the government open for 90 days. Mark Halperin-
MARK HALPERIN: It's phenomenal.
SCARBOROUGH: I was going to say, we knew it was going to be-
HALPERIN: A big number.
SCARBOROUGH: -a big number.
HALPERIN: But 71%.
So, pretty predictably, Scarborough and Halperin were both quite excited about Trump going up in several polls and getting good marks from the public for agreeing with the Democrats to keep the government open. But Scarborough continued:
Yeah, no, I, it's a 70/30 proposition while you have all these people on the far, far, far right, you know, basically doing what Steve Bannon did forever. And it really, it matches up with exactly what we've been saying around this set for seven and a half months: that the President is playing to 30% and working actively to enrage 70%. Well guess what? He reversed that when he stopped listening to the most extreme voices on the far right on talk radio who make money by whipping up their base and so what's happening? His poll numbers are going up.
It was not immediately clear who he was referring to regarding “far right” people on “talk radio,” but it’s probably safe to say that he was thinking of political commentators who millions of regular Americans listen to, read, or watch on a daily basis.
Halperin followed up Scarborough by trying to take the conversation back towards reality a bit by fulfilling his own prophecy and giving Trump some more positive coverage about working together with his political opposition:
We knew the President was enthused by the news coverage, including on this program, of the deal. That 71% number will get in front of him and he will see it, I think, as reinforcement that that is where the mood of the country [sic]. It's hard to get 71% ‘yes’ on anything given how polarized things are. [...] [Trump] is the most popular of the leaders in Washington. And this number, I think, will reinforce to him that he’s got the leverage and the freedom to make more deals.
But then, Willie Geist stepped into the conversation and got Scarborough all riled up again:
WILLIE GEIST: Do you remember a couple of weeks ago that tweet from Congressman Steve King after the deal where he said: the base is gone,-
SCARBOROUGH: [imitating Steve King] You’re gonna lose the base!
GEIST: -you’ve lost everybody. There's another poll that came out yesterday, the Monmouth poll. And this is just Trump voters, just Trump voters that were asked how they feel about him working with Democrats. Only 8%, 8% said they disapproved of him working with Democrats. 75% in the poll said he was working the right amount with Democrats or that he should work more with him. In total, it was 85%-
SCARBOROUGH: Yeah.
GEIST: -that thought he was doing the right thing by reaching across the aisle and just getting something done. He's in good standing with them.
Scarborough didn’t really want to talk about the polls though, apparently. Instead, he steered the conversation back towards trashing conservatives, and this time he got more specific:
Well, Coulter definitely has been quite critical of Trump recently, as have many others who have been concerned about him potentially reneging on key campaign promises about building a border wall, deporting illegal immigrants, and ending DACA. However, it does not appear that she has called for killing the President in either her columns or on her Twitter page. Morning Joe should take far more care before recklessly charging someone with committing a serious felony without evidence.
Moreover, Steve King, Hannity and others, according to their own words, were not upset at Trump for being bipartisan. They were upset by reports by the Associated Press and others that Trump was abandoning core promises, and even then, Rep. King couched his disappointment in the language of: “If AP is correct, Trump base blown up.” What’s “far, far, far right” about caring about politicians’ promises?
The full transcript:
7:01 AM EST
(...)
SCARBOROUGH: Coming up, his talks with the Democrats, President Trump seeing some improvement in the latest round of polling. A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released this morning shows that Donald Trump’s overall approval rating at [sic] 43%. That's three points higher than it was in August. 52% of Americans disapprove with the president's job rating. The numbers identical to Politico/Morning Consult poll and Monmouth University’s latest polling finds the President with a net negative rating in single digits: 40% approve, 49% disapprove. NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll also found that 71% of Americans support President Trump’s recent deal with Democratic leaders to provide hurricane relief and keep the government open for 90 days. Mark Halperin-
MARK HALPERIN: It's phenomenal.
SCARBOROUGH: I was going to say, we knew it was going to be-
HALPERIN: A big number.
SCARBOROUGH: -a big number.
HALPERIN: But 71%.
SCARBOROUGH: Yeah, no, I, it's a 70/30 proposition while you have all these people on the far, far, far right, you know, basically doing what Steve Bannon did forever. And it really, it matches up with exactly what we've been saying around this set for seven and a half months: that the President is playing to 30% and working actively to enrage 70%. Well guess what? He reversed that when he stopped listening to the most extreme voices on the far right on talk radio who make money by whipping up their base and so what's happening? His poll numbers are going up.
HALPERIN: We knew the President was enthused by the news coverage, including on this program, of the deal. That 71% number will get in front of him and he will see it, I think, as reinforcement that that is where the mood of the country [sic]. It's hard to get 71% ‘yes’ on anything given how polarized things are. The other thing in the NBC poll that’s so interesting to me that relates is: all the congressional leaders, both Nancy Pelosi and the Demo[crat] Republican leaders have very low approval numbers. And so, although the president still, despite the increase, has low, by historic standards, he is the king of the hill. He is the most popular of the leaders in Washington. And this number, I think, will reinforce to him that he’s got the leverage and the freedom to make more deals.
WILLIE GEIST: Do you remember a couple of weeks ago that tweet from Congressman Steve King after the deal where he said: the base is gone,-
SCARBOROUGH: [imitating Steve King] You’re gonna lose the base!
GEIST: -you’ve lost everybody. There's another poll that came out yesterday, the Monmouth poll. And this is just Trump voters, just Trump voters that were asked how they feel about him working with Democrats. Only 8%, 8% said they disapproved of him working with Democrats. 75% in the poll said he was working the right amount with Democrats or that he should work more with him. In total, it was 85%-
SCARBOROUGH: Yeah.
GEIST: -that thought he was doing the right thing by reaching across the aisle and just getting something done. He's in good standing with them.
SCARBOROUGH: Mika, we talked, yeah we talked about it at the time. Steve King tweets out: He's gonna lose his base! Ann Coulter says he should be killed,-
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: [shocked face] Oh, my God!
SCARBOROUGH: -he should be impeached,-
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: What a horrid thing-!
SCARBOROUGH: -Mike Pence should be President of the United States. Sean Hannity declared: It's over, exclamation point. Because he [Trump] was working in a bipartisan way. And of course, we said on the show, as we've said forever, only because we're right, that he should work with Democrats. That this, Americans are sick and tired of Washington D.C. not working and they, they will, will move to somebody that can make Republicans and Democrats work together. The president has been playing the lowest common denominator game, playing to his lowest 30%, just 30 % Mika. Now he’s doing something, he's reversed the equation.
BRZEZINSKI: He has.
(...)
