MSNBC’s The 11th Hour host Stephanie Ruhle continued to lament that House Republicans will not be conducting their business at the whims of late night cable hosts and former Democratic senators like Al Franken as the duo spent Wednesday night labeling Republicans the party of “tax cheats” and wondering who cares about the origins of COVID-19.
Decrying the state of the GOP, Ruhle recalled that, “The last time you were here, you said your wife said America voted to get rid of crazy.”
For Franken, crazy has returned, “And this is exactly what they want. They want people who are gonna govern, and responsibly, and look at their pocketbooks, and, you know, look at, you know -- for example, one of the first votes Republicans took was on cutting enforcement of tax cheats.”
Ruhle interrupted to agree, “Absurd. Absurd.” To which Franken absurdly added, “Which would've increased the deficit tremendously.”
If Ruhle had bothered to consult an actual Republican on the matter, it would have been pointed out that the deficit would remain around the same and that rich tax evaders can afford fancy lawyers that the common citizen or small business owner cannot.
Later in her interview, Ruhle asked Franken a question that she would never have asked of the January 6 committee or any investigation into Donald Trump’s taxes, “Then who are the millions of Americans that are saying, yes, let's spend money on a committee to dig into the origins of COVID. Who are the scores of voters that are saying I voted for that?”
Of course, Franken agreed with Ruhle, “I think it is scores. I think it's literally scores of voters. No, there’s scores-- they have a base. It's the MAGA base. And that's who they're preaching to.”
COVID’s origins have real national security and foreign policy ramifications as well as questions related to scientific ethics. It is a topic much more deserving of Congress’s time than D.C. statehood.
This segment was sponsored by Subaru.
Here is a transcript for the January 25 show:
MSNBC The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle
1/26/2023
11:36 PM ET
STEPHANIE RUHLE: The last time you were here, you said your wife said America voted to get rid of crazy.
AL FRANKEN: Yeah. She said they said, stop it.
RUHLE: Stop it. But--
FRANKEN: And this is exactly what they want. They want people who are gonna govern, and responsibly, and look at their pocketbooks, and, you know, look at, you know -- for example, one of the first votes Republicans took was on cutting enforcement of tax cheats.
RUHLE: Absurd. Absurd
FRANKEN: Which would've increased the deficit tremendously.
…
11:41 PM ET
RUHLE: Then who are the millions of Americans that are saying, yes, let's spend money on a committee to dig into the origins of COVID. Who are the scores of voters that are saying I voted for that?
FRANKEN: I think it is scores. I think it's literally scores of voters. No, there’s scores-- they have a base. It's the MAGA base. And that's who they're preaching to. But that is-- I think we saw in the last midterm that they really underperformed considering the history of what you would expect in a midterm where the president was at 40-- low 40s. And, you know, and if they keep this up, they’ll lose the House.
