False! 'Morning Joe' Says Trump's Pro-Israel 'Anti-Semitic Screed' Endangers Jews

Monday's Morning Joe launched quickly into Trump Attack Mode, bizarrely claiming Donald Trump put out a "dangerous" and "anti-Semitic screed" on his Truth Social account about American Jews and Israel. 

 

Today's Morning Joe deceptively cast this Trump "tweet" as suggesting that American Jews better get their act together before it's too late—for them!

 

That sounded ominous--until you read what Trump had actually written. 

 

 

Morning Joe flashed the message on the screen. But the writing was unusually small and dim -- similar to the fine print at the bottom of an ad. And no one on the show actually read the entirety of the relevant portion.  As you'll see here from the image of the actual tweet—not Morning Joe's dim version thereof [as seen at foot]—Trump wrote [emphasis added]:

 

 

In other words, far from making a threat against American Jews, Trump's tweet was actually a plea for greater support for Israel! That Israel was endangered, from neighboring anti-Semites like the Iranians.

 

But Morning Joe repeatedly insisted that Trump's tweet was "anti-Semitic." And not merely a "dog whistle," but "screaming it out loud."

 

In a dramatic display of twisting these remarks out of context, Jonathan Lemire claimed that Trump's tweet "could be interpreted by his followers as a moment to potentially commit violence against Jews." And Joe Scarborough said the tweet was akin to a previous one by Trump in which he said that Mitch McConnell had a "death wish."

 

Trump was saying no such thing. But Morning Joe was sending a false message to potentially deranged people out there that Trump was in fact calling for violence against Jews. So if there's any violence that emerges, they can point their fingers. 

 

Scarborough claimed Trump's "still smarting by the fact that over three-out-of-four Jews in America voted for Joe Biden." So let's guess that this is MSNBC trying to keep those Jewish Biden voters highly motivated to turn out over the next few weeks. 

 

PS: Lemire doubled down on the deception in saying that to defend himself against accusations of anti-Semitism, Trump points out that his daughter "married someone who is Jewish."  Ivanka didn't merely marry Jared Kushner. Before their marriage, she chose to convert to Judaism, and with him, helps maintain a Jewish home. 

 

Morning Joe deceptively depicting a Trump tweet as calling for violence against American Jews was sponsored by Tide, Johnson & Johnson, maker of Listerine, Abbott, maker of Rinvoq, Jeep, and Liberty Mutual. 

Here's the transcript.

MSNBC
Morning Joe
10/17/22
6:02 am EDT

JOE SCARBOROUGH: Jonathan, really quickly, on this anti-Semitic screed that Donald Trump went on yesterday. A lot of observers saying that I saw yesterday, at least, conservatives, saying this was his worst anti-Semitic rant yet. Talk, tell us, give us some reporting from it. What was it about? What was behind it?

JONATHAN LEMIRE: No one knows. It seems to have come out of nowhere, this rant from the former president over the weekend. But we have, he has danced very dangerous to anti-Semitic remarks before. Remember, a couple moments during the campaign that happened. His defense would be, well, my daughter married someone who is Jewish, Jared Kushner, and therefore I can't be anti-Semitic.

But this is pretty repulsive stuff yesterday. And it was, you're right, widely condemned, and not just by the usual Democrats. There were some conservatives who also spoke out against this. Obviously, the Anti-Defamation League and other groups worried about what this could yield, condemned what Trump posted on his fledgling social-media site. We haven't gotten anything else from the Trump camp on this. 

But we should take a moment and put this in context. This tweet comes at a moment where bias incidents and hate crimes, anti-Semitic incidents are already skyrocketing. They have really been on the rise in recent years, and it feels like we know the president has inspired the violence of January 6th, has seemingly called for his supporters to be violent other times, related to the Mar-a-Lago case, sending out warnings, seemingly threats to the FBI.

And the fear here is, this could be interpreted by his followers as a moment to potentially commit violence against Jews. And that is deeply worrisome, and we will now need to see who else steps forward and do any Republican lawmakers also condemn these remarks in the days ahead?

SCARBOROUGH: Well, and again, I mean, even the fine line, Jews need to basically get their act together before it's too late, obviously deeply disturbing because it's not, it's not sending a dog whistle. That's out-and-out --

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: No! Screaming it out loud.

SCARBOROUGH: And the thing is, that there were some observers that said as always, it's not about Jews in Israel, it's not about Jews in America, it's always about Donald Trump. 

He's still smarting by the fact that over three-out-of-four Jews in America voted for Joe Biden. So, there are people close to him that suggest that still rankles him, that he got beaten so badly among Jewish voters in America.

But, but, but to do that, and then to say basically, they better get their act together before it's too late, certainly does sounds ominous. It sounds ominous like saying that Mitch McConnell has a quote death wish.  

MIKA: Yeah, yeah. He's got a lot.