MSNBC co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski described the most recent performance by Donald Trump on the campaign trail as “pathetic” and “an embarrassment” on Morning Joe Monday.
In a discussion of Trump’s viability as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Brzezinski said “he is literally still vomiting out anything he thinks at the tip of his head that he might have seen on TV…it’s sad for the party, it’s sad for the country, and it’s sad for his candidacy”
Scarborough added Trump “could be doing so much better…Every day the embarrassment deepens because he just simply refuses to stop playing to the lowest common denominator.”
The comments come after a weekend interview Trump gave to Fox News Channel’s Howie Kurtz, where Trump accused Scarborough of going “totally rogue” and joining Democratic efforts to defeat Trump’s campaign. “He was embarrassed to be so high on a Republican…It’s very dishonest what he’s saying.”
Trump, who often rails against the news media and accuses them of unfair coverage, may be boosted by a report out Monday from the Media Research Center, a conservative nonprofit that studied network reporting on the campaign Trump soaking up the majority of coverage–but not to his benefit, as stories were four times more likely to focus on Trump scandals than Clinton scandals:
MRC analysts reviewed all 1,099 stories on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts which talked about the presidential campaign between January 1 through June 7, including weekends. This tally includes 950 full reports and interview segments; 66 short items read by the anchor; plus 83 stories on other topics that included some discussion of one or more of the candidates.
Compared to Clinton, a much higher percentage of Trump’s airtime (40 percent, or 432 minutes) was spent discussing the controversies surrounding the Republican’s candidacy. Only 18 percent of Clinton’s coverage (105 minutes) was spent discussing similar controversies, as network reporters paid scant attention to stories that would have garnered far more airtime had Trump been involved.