MSNBC’s Morning Joe is the kind of “news” program that laments that Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are supposedly portrayed as two equal candidates when, according to them, the latter is a lying liar who lies all the time and the former is just a normal candidate. However, for their Wednesday post-debate analysis, the assembled cast cheered Harris spreading fake news about pro-lifers, claiming the debate was “the most comprehensive beatdown” they’ve seen.
Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson claimed, “It was just the most comprehensive beatdown I have ever seen on a debate stage and I'm including the Trump-Biden debate where Biden beat himself, really, Donald Trump didn't do it. But it was just, I mean, if there were a mercy rule, it would have been called after you got to the first half-hour, 45 minutes.”
Co-host Joe Scarborough agreed, “It would’ve been called very early.”
Scarborough proceeded to introduce an extended clip of the debate’s abortion segment. In the clip, Harris claimed, “Pregnant women who want to carry a pregnancy to term, suffering from a miscarriage, being denied care in an emergency room because the health care providers are afraid they might go to jail and she's bleeding out in a car in the parking lot?”
Additionally, Trump did not answer the question of whether he would veto a national abortion ban, as he argued Congress is too divided to pass any abortion legislation.
Coming out of the clip, Scarborough and wife and fellow co-host Mika Brzezinski simultaneously tackled both angles. Scarborough declared, “He just wouldn’t answer that on the veto.”
At the same time, Brzezinski ranted about Trump’s federalist abortion stance, “He keeps lying, and Kamala Harris just very plainly put out there, [BBC correspondent] Katty Kay, the bitter truth, that what Trump has done to women's health in America is monstrous, and she very eloquently, but very clearly put out there what is happening in doctors' offices and emergency rooms across the country thanks to him.”
There is absolutely nothing in pro-life laws that states women should be denied miscarriage care, but Kay nevertheless agreed, “Yeah, I thought on a night of strong answers that was her strongest and when I was listening to it at the time, I marked that one down. She started with a policy. She took it to the personal and turned it back to Donald Trump.”
Kay was most disappointed in, not Harris’s falsehood, but the fact she was unable to repeat it, “I would’ve loved for her to have the opportunity to push him again on his response to those women who are bleeding out in emergency rooms or who are the victims of incest or the young kids who've had to be moved across borderlines and he managed to duck that, but it was a very powerful moment. Some of my colleagues with swing voters and several said where they felt the moment they would turn for Kamala Harris.”
It seems fact-checking only goes one way at the Morning Joe table.
Here is a transcript for the September 11 show:
MSNBC Morning Joe
9/11/2024
6:15 AM ET
EUGENE ROBINSON: And looking right at him. He wouldn't look back. It was just the most comprehensive beatdown I have ever seen on a debate stage and I'm including the Trump-Biden debate where Biden beat himself, really—
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Yeah.
ROBINSON: -- Donald Trump didn't do it. But it was just -- I mean, if there were a mercy rule--
JOE SCARBOROUGH: Yeah.
ROBINSON: -- it would have been called after you got to the first half-hour, 45 minutes
SCARBOROUGH: It would’ve been called very early. Let’s play a clip right now on abortion.
…
SCARBOROUGH: He just wouldn’t answer that on the veto.
BRZEZINSKI: Okay, so he keeps lying and through that, he keeps lying, and Kamala Harris just very plainly put out there, Katty Kay, the bitter truth, that what Trump has done to women's health in America is monstrous, and she very eloquently, but very clearly put out there what is happening in doctors' offices and emergency rooms across the country thanks to him.
KATTY KAY: Yeah, I thought on a night of strong answers that was her strongest and when I was listening to it at the time, I marked that one down. She started with a policy. She took it to the personal and turned it back to Donald Trump.
I would’ve loved for her to have the opportunity to push him again on his response to those women who are bleeding out in emergency rooms or who are the victims of incest or the young kids who've had to be moved across borderlines--
BRZEZINSKI: Right.
KAY: -- and he managed to duck that, but it was a very powerful moment. Some of my colleagues with swing voters and several said where they felt the moment they would turn for Kamala Harris.
