Scarborough: Political Power Is Rented Not Owned—Except When Democrats Take Texas

Mika Brzezinski Joe Scarborough MS NOW-Morning Joe 11-4-26

On Wednesday’s Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough spent the opening minutes repeatedly boasting of how he warned successive administrations: power is rented, not owned.

“I’ve said this all along. People get elected, and they think that they’re gonna be in power forever. I’ve warned successive administrations... that thought they were so powerful. I’ve warned them, see, you know, you only rent this place. And you better watch out, because you’re gonna get your ass kicked in two years if you don’t do it right.”

He extended the warning to the new Democratic majorities: “And that’s now true also of Democrats. They have to hit the issues that matter the most to voters.”

So: deliver on what voters care about, or the next cycle can take the keys back.

But Scarborough somehow applied a different rule to Texas. After John Heilemann noted that Democrats had swept every statewide office in a state where they had not won one in 32 years, Scarborough responded:

“We take no happiness in this happening [right!], because this happened because you brutalized Hispanics in a way that I told you personally was going to destroy you politically. I told you that. I told you it would destroy you politically. I warned you, you can’t do that. Secure the borders, but you can’t rove through neighborhoods terrorizing Americans, beating up Hispanics, killing Americans. This is what happened. Texas happened, and good luck, Republicans, ever getting that back.”

The impermanence of power he had just described for everyone else was suspended. Texas was permanent. The practices Scarborough disliked had, in his telling, cost Republicans the state forever.

Question for Joe: What if Democrats, in a return to the bad old Biden days, reopen the border, weaken enforcement measures, and let another flood of 10 million or so illegal immigrants into the country? Do they risk the same two-year rear-end kicking you just predicted for any party that fails to deliver? Or, at least in Texas, are Democrats somehow immunized from paying the price for their failure?

Willie Geist added that, beyond policy, voters were also saying “enough” to the “tone” of politics during the Trump years. 

Well, then: today’s show opened with a montage of victory remarks of several Democratic winners. Most kept their comments upbeat and focused on the voters.  But as you’ll see here, there was one tonal exception: Abdul El-Sayed decided to troll Trump: 

“Donald, look, I know you struggled with my name. So, after J.D. swears me in in January, you could just go on and call me Senator.” 

El-Sayed’s sneer was personal, boastful, and centered on settling a score with Trump rather than on the voters Geist said had had enough of precisely that “tone.” Or, as usual, MS NOW staffers think only the Republicans can be uncivil or harsh.

Note: The 2028 drumbeat for Talarico has already begun. Heilemann reported that a Talarico campaign staffer who worked on Obama’s 2008 campaign told him the Talarico phenomenon “feels a little bit like” Obama in Iowa in 2008—the caucus win that served as his springboard to the White House.

Here’s the transcript.

MS NOW
Morning Joe
11/4/26
6:11 am ET

JOE SCARBOROUGH: I've said, I've said this all along. People get elected, and they think that they're gonna be in power forever. I've warned successive administrations, and Mika has been there when I've warned successive administrations that thought they were so powerful. I, I've warned them, see, you know, you only rent this place. And, and you better watch out, because you're gonna get your ass kicked in two years if you don't do it right. And that's now true also of, of Democrats. They, they have, they have to hit the issues that matter the most to voters.

WILLIE GEIST: Definitely policy, but also politics and tone. America said enough.

. .  .

JOHN HEILEMANN: There had not been a Democrat elected statewide in Texas in 32 years.

SCARBOROUGH: Not one! Not one!

HEILEMANN: In every other state-- in every other state in America, there had been at least one statewide Democrat in those 32 years. Texas, the longest period of all Republican rule for 32 years, where they hadn't won a single statewide office, and then they won all of them last night. That is...

SCARBOROUGH: We took, we take no, no, no, no happiness in this happening, because this happened because you brutalized Hispanics in a way that I told you personally was going to destroy you politically. I told you that. I told you it would destroy you politically. I warned you, you can't do that. Secure the borders, but you can't rove through neighborhoods terrorizing Americans, beating up Hispanics, killing Americans. This is what happened. Texas happened, and good luck, Republicans, ever getting that back.

HEILEMANN: I ran into one of Jim's [Messina] colleagues yesterday, on the 2008 Obama campaign. Who is now at a, at a firm that was doing work for Talarico, and he said, you know, to me, he said, he said, this is like at noon or so, he said, he said, it's not quite, it doesn't feel quite like Iowa in 2008 with Obama, but it feels a little bit like that here with Talarico.