During their segment on Friday, Morning Joe co-hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough called President Donald Trump’s tweets “unbelievably alarming” for the country.
“It’s been fascinating and frightening and really sad for our country,” Brzezinski said, responding to Trump’s tweets on Thursday attacking the show and criticizing her appearance
“I’m fine. My family brought me up really tough. This is absolutely nothing for me personally,” she said. “But I am very concerned as to what this, once again, reveals about the President of the United States. It’s strange.”
Trump’s tweets drew condemnation from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers, who said they were “beneath the dignity of your office” and asked Trump to focus on policy priorities instead.
“It is unbelievably alarming that this president is so easily played,” Brzezinski said Friday. “What is it saying to our enemies that this president is so easily played?”
The White House on Thursday defended Trump’s comments, saying he “fights fire with fire” and was pushing back against criticism from the MSNBC hosts.
“We’re OK. The country’s not,” said Scarborough, who said Trump has a “disturbing obsession with Mika” and also accused White House officials of attempting to blackmail them with a negative National Enquirer story.
“We got a call that, ‘Hey, the National Enquirer is going to run a negative story against you guys,” Scarborough said. “They said, ‘If you call the president up and you apologize for your coverage, then he will pick up the phone and basically spike the story.’ I will just say three people at the very top of the administration calling me, and the response was like, ‘Are you kidding me? I don’t know what they have. Run a story. I’m not going to do it.’ The calls kept coming and kept coming.”
“Yesterday was just another example of just how deeply personal he is,” Scarborough added. “He attacks women because he fears women.”
Trump — who tweeted that he watched Morning Joe “for first time in long time” on Friday — denied Scarborough’s account of the National Enquirer story. “He called me to stop a National Enquirer article. I said no! Bad show,” Trump said.
.@morningmika: "It’s been fascinating and frightening and really sad for our country" #morningjoepic.twitter.com/Ch9fekp905
— Morning Joe (@Morning_Joe) June 30, 2017