There is perhaps no bigger race-baiting charlatan of the last three decades than Reverend Al Sharpton. The President of the National Action Network has spent his entire career pushing race-hoaxes, inciting race riots, peddling anti-Semitic slurs, and grifting towards powerful figures that boosted his profile. Through all of it, he was rewarded with a lucrative TV career at MSNBC and being called “arguably the country’s most influential civil rights leader” by Vanity Fair.
After President Trump took to Twitter to attack Sharpton, Joe Scarborough brought the Reverend onto a Monday segment of Morning Joe to, once again, claim that all of Trump criticisms of liberal African-Americans have to do with race:
AL SHARPTON: Well, I think this is Trump getting ready for -- he's going to attack the most visible black person that comes across his desk and he thinks can set a tone. I'm not going to bite the bait. The fact of the matter is I have released on Instagram -- my Instagram, pictures of Donald Trump coming to National Action Network conventions. One where he was standing with James Brown and Reverend Jackson, despite the fact that I marched on him about Central Park, and marched on him -- he comes to my convention because he respects my work — now all of a sudden I'm all of these names. Fine. The fact of the matter is, if he came to my convention the National Action Network, I couldn't have conned him to come.
He came because he was trying to have it both ways, which he's trying to do now. We need to stand up and deal with the fact that this President's policies hurt people all over this country and despite -- people like Elijah Cummings have delivered for their district and could deliver more if they were empowered that we need not get into the side show of a man that one minute calls you names and next minute stands up and smiling with you at your convention. He'll do anything, including to his own supporters, if it's to his advantage. I'm not going to fall prey to that. I'm not going to bite that bait.
It is interesting to watch Sharpton talk about immorality in public discourse considering he is responsible for pushing several race-baiting stories. In 1987, he was guilty by a jury in New York of defamation for his role in pushing the false rape accusations of 15-year-old black girl Tawana Brawley against four white men. In 1991, following the accidental death of a black child hit by the car of Orthodox Rabbi Menachem Schneerson, Sharpton’s fierce demagoguery stirred violence against Jewish people in Brooklyn.
A few days later, 29-year-old Orthodox Jew Yankel Rosembaum was murdered in cold blood. Sharpton has referred to Jews as “diamond merchants,” “white interlopers,” “Jew bastards,” and “bloodsucking Jews.”
Through all of his bigoted acts, Sharpton’s profile has only gone up thanks to unprincipled members of the media like Scarborough.
While he was a member of Congress in 2000, Scarborough sponsored a resolution that condemned the “racist and incendiary actions of the Reverend Al Sharpton.” He now refers to him as “a good friend.” This is the reverse of Morning Joe’s relationship with Trump. Scarborough and his wife Mika Brzezinski were one of the biggest reasons Trump won the 2016 Primary by giving him the friendliest media platform to boost his campaign. Just the other day, Scarborough said that Trump was worse than George Wallace.
Scarborough has a long history of shifting with the media winds. He’s been pro-Trump and anti-Trump. He’s been anti-Sharpton and pro-Sharpton. Apparently truth lies in what’s best for Joe Scarborough.
The full transcript is below. Click "expand" to read more.
Morning Joe
07/29/2019
7:01:44 A.M. Eastern
JOE SCARBOROUGH: One thing he cares about, though, is attacking black men. He loves attacking black men, he loves attacking black women. He's doing -- and the pace, as I said last hour, is quickening and now he's attacking our good friend Al Sharpton. Reverend Al is on the phone right now. So Rev, you're in the Elijah Cummings hall of fame and I would call it a hall of fame because such a good man. But so Donald Trump tweeting today, he said that you and he always got along well and that you loved Trump, but he said that you hate whites and hate cops, which is very interesting, Al, because I think you probably know and most people that know me know I'm about as white as they come and you and I are really good friends. What do you think about Donald Trump now reaching out, after attacking Elijah Cummings all weekend, now deciding to start attacking you?AL SHARPTON: Well, I think this is Trump getting ready for -- he's going to attack the most visible black person that comes across his desk and he thinks can set a tone. I'm not going to bite the bait. The fact of the matter is I have released on Instagram -- my Instagram, pictures of Donald Trump coming to National Action Network conventions. One where he was standing with James Brown and Reverend Jackson, despite the fact that I marched on him about Central Park, and marched on him -- he comes to my convention because he respects my work -- now all of a sudden I'm all of these names. Fine. The fact of the matter is, if he came to my convention the National Action Network, I couldn't have conned him to come. He came because he was trying to have it both ways, which he's trying to do now. We need to stand up and deal with the fact that this President's policies hurt people all over this country and despite -- people like Elijah Cummings have delivered for their district and could deliver more if they were empowered that we need not get into the side show of a man that one minute calls you names and next minute stands up and smiling with you at your convention. He'll do anything, including to his own supporters, if it's to his advantage. I'm not going to fall prey to that. I'm not going to bite that bait.
SCARBOROUGH: You know, Rev, we talked about this before. We even ran a package on Morning Joe a couple of months ago talking about how Donald Trump has shifted his position on race time and again. He went from Central Park Five myths to then suddenly in the 1990s when it served him well to be close friends with people of color, with boxers, with hip-hop artists, with civil rights leaders like yourself. Suddenly, he was your best friend. He, again, even dated African-American women even into the 2000s and had a very close relationship with people of color in New York City and across America. Now, suddenly, now suddenly, you know, he gets into politics. He plays the birther card and now he's even attacking you. Somebody that he has long said he was close with.
SHARPTON: Yeah, and you have got to ask yourself this question. He would support us and come to us even after I would challenge him and march on him about Central Park and attack him on birther. But make this note, Joe and Mika. On December 1, 2016, three weeks after the election, he called me after seeing me on this show, Morning Joe, and asked me to come and meet with him. He had won the election. He was president-elect, and he wanted me to come meet with him at Mar-a-Lago. I said I will only meet with you if I can bring other leaders of national civil rights organizations. "No, Al, I just know you, let's meet and let's talk." Why would you want, as president-elect of the United States to meet with a troublemaker and a conman other than you are knowing better than that. That's who he is and we know who he is. The question is what are we going to do about it?
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: So that's -- that is the question. And I have some questions for you about that, Reverend Al. Obviously you don't want to take the bait. You -- you know how he operates and you can handle it, I can get that. But how does one stand up, how do people stand up who know this is wrong? The concern, of course, is that if you laugh this off or say it's just Donald Trump, you know, that's the way he is, we are desensitizing people by the day to racism. Something that is clearly wrong, that is against the law. And so my question for you is how do we not ignore this? What is the action that needs to be taken? It's obviously upon the Republicans who are still stepping up for Trump and defending him with their silence, what is the best way to hold them accountable and to have them speak out and put their names and faces on this if this is what they support or to finally force them to speak out against what is clearly wrong? How does that happen? How do we do that?
SHARPTON: I think inherent in your question, because we got to change our target, where we start challenging the Republicans, particularly those up for Senate races this year, that you're going to stand up and really deal with the head of your party, Donald Trump, or you're the one that's going to suffer the consequences. You must make the target McConnell who is running again in Kentucky and those that have some skin in the game in 2020. And tell them that you are co-signers and co-conspirators and accomplices to the moral decay that this president is putting forward. And you've got to challenge his cheerleaders. Ask people like the Fox crowd, then if these people are so bad, Joe Scarborough and you, Mika, and now me and Elijah Cummings, then why does the president call people like Sharpton and ask him for meetings and make him look to his own base inconsistent, but use that to go after the senators and the Republican leadership that have laryngitis -- while he's peddling racism and dividing this country. We must say that we may not get him directly to ever to grow up, that’s obvious, but we can certainly make those around him know that you're going down with him or you're going to stand up with us.
