NBC’s Andrea Mitchell: Republicans Forced Out 'Woman of Color,' Susan Rice

Following Susan Rice’s abrupt withdrawal from being considered for Secretary of State, NBC's Andrea Mitchell felt it important to sneer that Republican opposition to Ms. Rice was racially motivated.

Speaking on MSNBC’s The Cycle Thursday afternoon, Mitchell’s immediate analysis of Rice’s withdrawal was that, “this is not going to help Republicans at all, the fact that a woman and a woman of color has been forced out of a confirmation process even before she was nominated.” Andrea Mitchell must have forgotten that four years ago, Republicans in the Senate confirmed an African-American woman named Condoleezza Rice to be Secretary of State. But that wouldn't fit the liberal narrative NBC and MSNBC continue to peddle that Republicans have racist motivations behind their objections to Rice’s nomination to Secretary of State.  [See video below page break.  MP3 audio here.]    

Mitchell then followed this snarky, partisan comment by pointing out the legitimate criticism against Rice’s potential nomination for Secretary of State:

She clearly was the President's choice, but I think what happened is that it became untenable, that they began to look through, the critics all sorts of other aspects of her background, her finances, the kinds of things that would normally come out in a confirmation. But she didn't have the defense, the group around her that you would have if you were the nominee from the White House, if you had been vetted and had that whole array of defenses. She was on her own really and left hanging.

After being pushed by co-host S.E. Cupp about the upcoming Benghazi hearings, Mitchell did acknowledge Rice’s infamous role in the aftermath of the attack on our embassy in Libya: 

Well, I think that there needed to be some resolution before those hearings because those hearings are going to be very difficult as it is, and that would have been a preview, only a taste of what it would have been like for her to have her, Susan Rice to have her confirmation hearings where it would have all been about Benghazi would have continued to eat away.

Sadly, Mitchell cannot give a balanced analysis of why Rice withdrew her name from consideration, and instead had to lower herself into making a pathetic liberal talking point that opposition to Rice had racial undertones in it. 

See relevant transcript below. 

MSNBC

The Cycle

December 13, 2012

3:50 p.m. EST

KRYSTAL BALL: I want to now bring in NBC Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell, and Andrea, what are you hearing about Susan Rice withdrawing her name

ANDREA MITCHELL: Well I think that this had become sort of an impossible challenge for her to be confirmed.  That she realized that, The White House realized it as well. I think they know that they are on good political solid ground as you were just pointing out. This is not going to help Republicans at all, the fact that a woman and a woman of color has been forced out of a confirmation process even before she was nominated. She clearly was the president's choice, but I think what happened is that it became untenable, that they began to look through, the critics all sorts of other aspects of her background, her finances, the kinds of things that would normally come out in a confirmation but she didn't have the defense, the group around her that you would have if you were the nominee from the white house if you had been vetted and had that whole array of defenses. She was on her own really and left hanging.

BALL: Andrea, is there any indication here that there was actually pressure from the administration for Susan Rice to make this move?

MITCHELL: I don't know that, but I think it probably became clear she could probably read the tea leaves, and I don't know right now because we're talking to you and I haven't done additional reporting, whether she's still a possibility for National Security Adviser. That is the powerful white house position that does not require confirmation.  So If Tom Donilon the very successful National Security Advisor were to move to the CIA or one of the other posts that's now likely to be open, it would be possible for Susan Rice to become national security adviser and to be that close with the president.

S.E. CUPP: Well, and Andrea, is there any indication that the upcoming hearings on December 20th had any affect on this coming out today?

MITCHELL: Well, I think that there needed to be some resolution before those hearings because those hearings are going to be very difficult as it is, and that would have been a preview, only a taste of what it would have been like for her to have her, Susan Rice to have her confirmation hearings where it would have all been about Benghazi would have continued to eat away.  And then also the signal this week that John McCain asked for, told people that he wanted to ask the leadership to put him on the Foreign Relations Committee. He is the senior person on the Armed Services Committee, and for him to then be on foreign relations as well meant he would have been in a key role as someone on the committee confirming her or any other secretary of state. So that was going to be difficult. This was personal. This is where it gets back to the 2008 campaign and things that Susan Rice said as a combatant in that campaign on behalf of Barack Obama about john McCain and about his trip in 2007 to Iraq, and that did not go over well. So they viewed her as a political person, not a diplomat, despite the fact that she's the U.N. Ambassador, was a powerful state department figure, was in the NSC, and been in the previous Democratic administration and is a Stanford educated Rhodes Scholar with graduate degrees from Oxford.