MSNBC White House correspondent Geoff Bennett guest-hosted MSNBC Live on Monday where he editorialized with the always-editorializing Philip Rucker of The Washington Post about President Trump's campaign strategy that allegedly involves instilling fear and division in the hopes igniting conflict through out the country.
After playing a clip of Kellyanne Conway on Fox & Friends talking about riots and violence in cities across the country, the need for law and order, and how Trump is the best candidate on that issue, Bennett didn't toss to Rucker with a question.
Instead, he crowned himself a liberal hack and pundit with this comment: "So, the President can't campaign on the economy, he can’t campaign on his handling of the coronavirus, so he's apparently taking a page out of his old playbook, which is stoking fear and division."
Rucker naturally agreed, "That does appear to be what's happening." He claimed that by focusing on violence, Trump is fearmongering:
[W]hat they are trying to do, and they are very clear about it, they're trying to scare women voters, white women voters in the suburbs who supported Donald Trump in 2016, but who went with Democrats in the 2018 midterms, and they're trying to bring them back into the fold and make them fearful of what this unrest would mean going forward.
Echoing the latest talking points to come out of the Biden campaign, Rucker then claimed, "Of course, Joe Biden is not the president. This is all happening on Trump's watch and all you have to do is look at the president's Twitter feed to see how he is trying to instigate some of the conflict playing out across our country."
Later in the segment, after talking with the Lincoln Project's Michael Steele about public opinion on the matter, the White House reporter even admitted to acting like a pundit:
There’s new polling that shows white Americans in battleground states, places like Wisconsin, may not be -- they're not as supportive of the Black Lives Matter movement as they were earlier this summer in the immediate aftermath of the police killing of George Floyd. Now, part of this, and this is just my own opinion, is that Black Lives Matter, that --- that movement, is being applied to protesters broadly and inappropriately and the actual message is being drowned out by people who might be social justice demonstrators but they're not really Black Lives Matter affiliated.
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Here is the relevant transcript:
MSNBC Live
August 31, 2020
9:11 AM ETGEOFF BENNETT: So, the President can't campaign on the economy, he can’t campaign on his handling of the coronavirus, so he's apparently taking a page out of his old playbook, which is stoking fear and division.
PHILIP RUCKER: That does appear to be what's happening, Geoff, and by the way Kellyanne Conway's comments there, she's not the only one in Trump's orbit who believes that. And in my reporting over the last couple of days with the number of Trump advisers, they feel that this continued unrest in Kenosha, in Portland, potentially in other cities later into the fall is only going to help Trump politically, what they are trying to do, and they are very clear about it, they're trying to scare women voters, white women voters in the suburbs who supported Donald Trump in 2016, but who went with Democrats in the 2018 midterms, and they're trying to bring them back into the fold and make them fearful of what this unrest would mean going forward. And to do so, the President is going to be reiterating that law and order message and make people feel like he's the only one that can bring some order to the streets. Of course, Joe Biden is not the president. This is all happening on Trump's watch and all you have to do is look at the president's Twitter feed to see how he is trying to instigate some of the conflict playing out across our country.
(....)
BENNETT: And Phil, to Michael Steele's great point, this is actually borne out in polling data. There’s new polling that shows white Americans in battleground states, places like Wisconsin, may not be -- they're not as supportive of the Black Lives Matter movement as they were earlier this summer in the immediate aftermath of the police killing of George Floyd. Now, part of this, and this is just my own opinion, is that Black Lives Matter, that --- that movement, is being applied to protesters broadly and inappropriately and the actual message is being drowned out by people who might be social justice demonstrators but they're not really Black Lives Matter affiliated.
