North Dakota Gov. and GOP presidential candidate Doug Burgum took his campaign to MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports on Thursday where he ever so politely informed the eponymous host that he isn’t an extremist on abortion and that her framing of “LGBTQ issues” is all wrong, including how she portrayed the Supreme Court standing up for religious liberty.
Altogether, it was a masterclass in how not to interview a presidential candidate. After first asking three questions about Donald Trump, Mitchell finally asked Burgum about Burgum or, perhaps more accurately, issued declarative statements about him, “Let me ask you about a couple of specific issues: abortion. You signed into law one of the strictest bans in the nation at six weeks with no exceptions for rape and incest victims. So, many people according to polls, the majority, believe that, that is extreme.”
Burgum responded by taking the federalist position, “Well, I support the Dobbs decision and this return the power of this decision back to the states and what’s right for North Dakota’s not going to work for California, New York. It doesn't even work for Minnesota and so I think that decision should remain at the states.”
Moving on, Mitchell had another statement that pretended to be a question, “I want to ask you also about LGBTQ issues because you are also against LGBTQ rights.”
Pushing back on that characterization, Burgum declared, “Well, that’s not exactly true because we believe every American needs to be respected and all of that and so I'm not exactly sure what you are saying because we do support fairness in women's sports. We do support making sure we've got inclusive environments in what we do and so I'm not exactly sure how you're making that statement.”
Mitchell then finally asked an actual question, however the framing of which was still heavily skewed, “Well, do support some of the recent rulings, including the Supreme Court ruling that ruled against a website serving customers who are gay?”
The Court actually ruled in favor of the website, but misspoken words aside, Burgum corrected the more egregious issue of Mitchell’s framing, “Well, that's really about religious freedom and in America one of the things that has been a hallmark for our whole country is, you know, we have freedom from religion.”
Here it was Burgum that misspoke, clearly meaning freedom of religion. Undeterred, he continued, “We have freedom of speech; you can't have compelled speech in this country. You can't, you know, require people to say things they don't want to say. We've also got freedom from religion. Not just freedom of religion and so I support the Supreme Court on that decision, because it's really about—it’s about free speech and it’s about religious freedom.”
The case was also about same-sex weddings not gay people per se. Still, this is what happens when your network thinks Joe Scarborough is a principled conservative. When an actual Republican comes on air and says Republican things, the host has to be corrected several times because beating up straw men no longer goes unchallenged.
This segment was sponsored by Colonial Penn.
Here is a transcript for the July 6 show:
MSNBC Andrea Mitchell Reports
7/6/2023
12:30 PM ET
ANDREA MITCHELL: Let me ask you about a couple of specific issues: abortion. You signed into law one of the strictest bans in the nation at six weeks with no exceptions for rape and incest victims. So, many people according to polls, the majority, believe that, that is extreme.
DOUG BURGUM: Well, I support the Dobbs decision and this return the power of this decision back to the states and what’s right for North Dakota’s not going to work for California, New York. It doesn't even work for Minnesota and so I think that decision should remain at the states.
MITCHELL: And let’s-- I want to ask you also about LGBTQ issues because you are also against LGBTQ rights.
BURGUM: Well, that’s not exactly true because we believe every American needs to be respected and all of that and so I'm not exactly sure what you are saying because we do support fairness in women's sports. We do support making sure we've got inclusive environments in what we do and so I'm not exactly sure how you're making that statement.
MITCHELL: Well, do support some of the recent rulings, including the Supreme Court ruling that ruled against a website serving customers who are gay?
BURGUM: Well, that's really about religious freedom and in America one of the things that has been a hallmark for our whole country is, you know, we have freedom from religion. We have freedom of speech; you can't have compelled speech in this country. You can't, you know, require people to say things they don't want to say. We've also got freedom from religion. Not just freedom of religion and so I support the Supreme Court on that decision, because it's really about—it’s about free speech and it’s about religious freedom.
