After two days of radio silence, MSNBC's Morning Joe finally got around to discussing Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar's latest anti-Semitic comments.
Previous anti-Semitic comments by Omar led to the morning show spending most of their time condemning Republicans for supposed hypocrisy. On Wednesday, Andrea Mitchell tried to appear as if she was condemning Omar but ended up making excuses for her and also deflecting to the misdeeds of others.
After noting the Democratic resolution condemning anti-Semitism was delayed and would now include condemnation of all forms of hate, co-host Mika Brzezinski noted that this was not Omar's first offense, asking Mitchell, "What happened here?"
Mitchell responded by saying, "Well, she believes this," which should have been the end of it. Despite the fact that Omar has now rolled off what Mary Katharine Ham on CNN referred to as the "anti-Semitic trope trifecta" of hypnotism, money and influence, and now dual loyality, Mitchell then offered multiple excuses for Omar's behavior.
Omar and other progressive freshman just do not "fully understand all the dynamics" at work, the journalist argued. Mitchell added that Omar might not understand "the dynamics" of Congress or she may simply may not care. Either one is not exactly a rousing defense of her comments, especially if "dynamics" means not accusing Americans of owing allegiance to a foreign country. What is certain is that she has now engaged in anti-Semitism even after her supposedly sincere apology and promise to learn from her money and influence comments. Yet, Mitchell, others from the media, and Democratic politicians defend her by showcasing her political inexperience, trying to rewrite history by saying she was merely criticizing Israeli policy, or making her a victim.
Noting that the resolution condemning anti-Semitism in the House-- that did not even name Omar-- would also include condemnations of Islamophobia, Mitchell deflected, "She herself has been the subject of racist protests," including some posters in the West Virginia state capital that Omar "was somehow linked to 9/11 because she's a Muslim."
Mitchell then launched to Morning Joe's new favorite tradition of using Omar's anti-Semitism to bash President Trump, "Look, this comes after Pittsburgh, after growing anti-Semitism... This has been a terrible period with the rise of anti-Semitism since Charlottesville, really, and you see a lack of leadership in the White House speaking out against all of this."
Here is a transcript for the March 6 show:
7:20 AM ET
(...)
ANDREA MITCHELL: Right now, she’s got other problems to deal with, which is delaying to tomorrow we understand this resolution over the comments, the controversial comments Illhan Omar, the freshman congresswoman from Minnesota and the whole conflict, generational as well among Democrats as to how to tough to be and pressure from the Republicans to really make this a very tough vote, just in writing the resolution they had to amend it last night.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: The comments by the congresswoman are not the first comments. What's behind that do you think? Where does that stand, especially as Nancy Pelosi is trying to sort of keep the Congress moving forward on a high level and yet they keep sort of tripping up on comments or missteps, especially this congresswoman. What happened here?
MITCHELL: Well she believes this, and she was -- she's stepping into a new role, these freshman, a number of them are stepping into a new role and don't fully understand all the dynamics, and she certainly stepped right into it by, in essence, repeating a trope that questions whether you can be committed to supporting Israel in international relations and whether that questions your allegiance to the United States. Now that said, she herself has been the subject of racist protests, West Virginia there were signs against her suggesting that she was somehow linked to 9/11 because she's Muslim. There have been anti-Muslim, you know, terrible comments as well. That's how they were trying to combine that into the resolution that was written about the anti-Semitism. Look this also comes after Pittsburgh, after growing anti-Semitism. You hear this from the Southern Law Project, excuse me I'm forgetting the name of the group in the south which tracks anti-Semitism and other racist and ethnic slurs around the country. This has been a terrible period with the rise of anti-Semitism since Charlottesville really and you see a lack of leadership in the White House speaking out against all of this.
BRZEZINSKI: Southern Poverty Law Center.
MITHCELL: Southern Poverty Law Center, the great work that they do.
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