On Monday's MTP Daily on MSNBC, during a discussion of the fact that President Donald Trump's approval rating has stayed the same in spite of recent bad news, fill-in host Katy Tur was exasperated as she was clearly cheering for his approval rating to fall, and wondered if there was any reason to be "optimistic" that it would.
Longtime MSNBC contributor Jonathan Alter described people as "deluded" who think Trump is doing a good job as President.
At 5:09 p.m. Eastern, after recounting last week's news of legal problems by former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort, and former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, an agitated Tur exclaimed:
Last week was a tidal wave of bad news for this presidency and this President, and his approval rating stayed the same. So I wonder -- I mean, if that's not going to move the needle, is this John McCain thing going to move the needle?
And forgive me for being skeptical because I was under the impression, as was most people, that when Donald Trump came out and said he wasn't a war hero -- he likes the guys that don't get caught -- back in 2015, that people would care. And when I went out and I talked to Republican voters, they didn't care at all.
Alter described Trump supporters as "deluded" as he began: "The Republicans don't care, but 43 percent is both a very high number when you realize that that many people are so deluded as to believe this guy is a good President, but it's also a pretty low number."
In fact, Trump's approval rating in the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll is 46 percent.
Tur soon added:
Eighty-eight percent of Republicans still support him -- 88 percent. I'm sorry, I just -- I start to wonder when we have these conversations and we say, 'Well, this is going to be the breaking point,' I wonder if there is a breaking point. I wonder if enough people in this country find the actions and the behavior repulsive enough to want to change what's going on.
The MSNBC host recounted that, during the 2008 presidential campaign, Republican voters did not seem to care after Trump dismissed John McCain's war record, and then fretted: "I'm just wondering why people are optimistic that things are going to change.
