On multiple occasions throughout Thursday’s Hardball on MSNBC, liberal host Chris Matthews made his feelings clear that he was livid at the Obama administration over revelations hours earlier that they indeed waited to give Iran $400 million that they claimed to have been repayment for money frozen during the 1979 revolution until four American hostages had left Iran.
Matthews admitted that he was “blown away by the news” and firmly declared that “they’re going to pay for this” in reference to the left and the Obama administration for misleading the American people until State Department spokesman John Kirby was pushed under intense questioning by reporters to confess.
Newly-minted Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway was the first on Hardball to bring up the story and Matthews promptly praised her for calling out the Obama administration’s denials of “linkage and now they’re admitting linkage.”
Speaking afterward to GOP strategist John Feehery, Matthews predicted that “[t]his is front-page, top of the fold and it’s going to hurt — the State Department, the administration” before continuing to spout off against the President:
Don't ever say something that can be disproved later. There's no point in it. You don't save yourself anything and if you can say there's no connection between the $400 million we sent over there in currency, in cash, had nothing to do with releasing the prisoners, our POWs over there, hostages and then it turns out we were giving them the money, what is it, only after they released the hostages so there was a connection.
<<< Please consider helping NewsBusters financially with your tax-deductible contribution today >>>
The perturbed Matthews later lurted out to MSNBC host/NBC News correspondent Andrea Mitchell that since there’s now “linkage,” “[t]hey’re going to pay for this” because “PR is truth” and “[w]hen in doubt, put it out.”
After NBC News campaign correspondent Hallie Jackson set the scene at a Trump rally in North Carolina and that the GOP candidate would address the news, Matthews only grew firmer in his denouncements of Obama:
Yeah, the administration could have been clearer on this, they could have been honest and apparently they were not. We’re going to hear a lot of this noise. This is what you don't do in politics. You don't let somebody else bring the story out in a tough question in a briefing. Today they got the truth, why did we have to wait so long for the truth?
Before making one of multiple comments imploring Republicans to not seize too much on this because of what happened with Iran-Contra, the Hardball host and Obama fan told his roundtable that he’s been “blown away” by the revelation (that really shouldn’t be surprising if he had been paying attention):
I was blown away by the news that just came out that the State Department spokesman, John Kirby, a foreign service professional, doing his job, said yes, there was a linkage to getting our people back from Iran and paying that $400 million. It was linked and they had always denied it before.
The relevant portions of the transcript from MSNBC’s Hardball on August 18 can be found below.
MSNBC’s Hardball
August 18, 2016
7:08 p.m. EasternKELLYANNE CONWAY: You know, Chris, I think it's very relevant today that the Clinton Foundation said if in fact she's elected president, they would stop taking money from foreign entities. Why do we have to wait that long?
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Good point.
CONWAY: Or are they admitting some kind of guilt there? It's more relevant to talk about the fact that just today, the State Department confirmed the $400 million paid to Iran was quote, for leverage which of course to lots of Americans means ransom no matter how people want to wordsmith it. This was — talk about pay for play for exchange, so I think there are so many things to —
MATTHEWS: I think you’ve got a good point there, Kellyanne, don't bury your lead because that's a very good point.
CONWAY: Yeah. That’s my style.
MATTHEWS: Until now, they have been denying linkage and now they’re admitting linkage. The linkage between the $400 million and the hostages getting out and everybody’s looking at that, going wait a minute, you said there was no linkage. Good point there.
(....)
JOHN FEEHERY: One man's ransom is another man's contingency. I think this is really unbelievable.
MATTHEWS: This is front-page, top of the fold and it’s going to hurt — the State Department, the administration.
FEEHERY: It's going to hurt Obama. It’s going to hurt Hillary and as long as the Trump campaign doesn't get in the way of the story. Let's not make any other news, guys.
MATTHEWS: Why in the world didn’t she — I would have — if I was Kellyanne I would have talked about it for ten minutes. Here's the problem and you can lay it out from your point of view. Don't ever say something that can be disproved later. There's no point in it. You don't save yourself anything and if you can say there's no connection between the $400 million we sent over there in currency, in cash, had nothing to do with releasing the prisoners, our POWs over there, hostages and then it turns out we were giving them the money, what is it, only after they released the hostages so there was a connection.
(....)
MATTHEWS: Would we have gotten the prisoners out without delivering the money?
ANDREA MITCHELL: He said that they had concerns.
MATTHEWS: No. Would they have gotten the prisoners home if we hadn't given the money? From the other way.
MITCHELL: We don't know. He said they had concerns they wouldn't get out so they sat on the money until we knew the prisoners were out and then delivered the money. They came this is still not ransom because —
MATTHEWS: But it is linkage.
MITCHELL: It's linkage. He says I'm not going to deny the linkage but I'm telling you it's not ransom because it was the Iran's money, not our money.
MATTHEWS: They’re going to pay for this. PR is truth.
MITCHELL: It’s already — everyone’s jumping on it.
MATTHEWS: When in doubt, put it out.
(....)
MATTHEWS: Yeah, the administration could have been clearer on this, they could have been honest and apparently they were not. We’re going to hear a lot of this noise. This is what you don't do in politics. You don't let somebody else bring the story out in a tough question in a briefing. Today they got the truth, why did we have to wait so long for the truth?
(....)
MATTHEWS: I was blown away by the news that just came out that the State Department spokesman, John Kirby, a foreign service professional, doing his job, said yes, there was a linkage to getting our people back from Iran and paying that $400 million. It was linked and they had always denied it before.
PAUL SINGER: And President Obama gave a press conference — President Obama gave a press conference said this was not a nefarious deal, there was no linkage, it was a debt that we owed them from some old —
MATTHEWS: Why’d hide it?
SINGER: And by the way, they are still saying and I believe it's still true, right, that this was frozen assets that was owed to the Iranians.
MATTHEWS: From 1979.
SINGER: But now it is also clear that this money sat on a tarmac waiting for our prisoners to be released. If that's not money for hostages I don't know what is and they look stupid.
MATTHEWS: And going over in an unmarked boat to deliver the cash in these pallets or pallets or whatever they’re called. it had the mark of something like, it reminded me of the Cuban missile crisis where we made a deal to get rid of Turkish missiles but it had to be done a little later.
(....)
HOWARD FINEMAN: The annoying thing, I think, to the American people might be that President Obama was insulting their intelligence. Not their secret intelligence. Their brains because it was obvious, it was obvious to anybody what went down. The pallets of money in the foreign currencies because they couldn’t — the unmarked ship. Come on and the President executed one of those maneuvers where he overstated the accusation and then denied it. He said this is not a nefarious deal —
MATTHEWS: Straw man.
FINEMAN: — key word nefarious, it was I deal and everybody knew it and that in addition to the substance of it I think is what gives a political opening to the Republicans.
