MSNBC host Joy Reid suggested on a live broadcast on Monday that former President Trump bore the “consequences” for “encouraging” the violence while discussing the weekend’s assassination attempt.
Reid, who was in Milwaukee for MSNBC’s live coverage of the Republican National Convention, made her comments after Rachel Maddow said she hoped some “calming” would emerge over political violence, calling it “no joke” and “not something anybody should ever toy with.” She, too, seemed to suggest that Trump had been a victim of the storm.
“Violence, like everything else, is very unpredictable. Once it becomes part of the political system, you don’t know which direction it’s going to go,” Maddow said. “Nobody can control it to go in one direction. It doesn’t work that way.”
ABC’s George Stephanopoulos says Trump and his supporters contributed to “violent rhetoric”
Republican presidential nominee and former president Donald Trump is surrounded by U.S. Secret Service agents during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, Saturday, July 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Reid agreed, then began recounting the “one and only time” she felt scared in the line of duty: at the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland, when armed men “promenaded” near her booth in an “intimidating” manner to “send a message.”
She likened her experience to reports of voter intimidation during the 2022 midterm elections, when a group of armed members of Clean Elections USA were ordered to stay at least 250 feet away from certain polling places in Arizona after complaints that people carrying guns and wearing masks were intimidating voters.
“I think about the people who were trying to vote in Arizona and there were men with long guns standing outside their polling places sending them a message,” Reed said. “‘If you don’t vote the right way, I’m here with this gun.'”
Republican convention kicks off two days after assassination attempt on Trump
Secret Service agents escorted former President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump onstage at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
“The idea of political violence that we have had ever since is so dangerous,” she continued, “so dangerous that even if you are one of the promoters of it, you cannot avoid the consequences.”
Critics of X Blame Reid This is because he appears to have described the attempted assassination of President Trump as “what goes around comes around.”
MSNBC pulls anti-Trump show ‘Morning Joe’ following assassination attempt
Reid’s comments on MSNBC were particularly surprising given that the network pulled its anti-Trump show “Morning Joe” in the aftermath of Saturday’s election. Assassination attemptA person familiar with the decision told CNN that the show was moved to a live broadcast in part over concerns that one of the show’s many guests during the four-hour broadcast “might make inappropriate comments live that could undermine the show and the network as a whole.”
Republican presidential candidate and former president Donald Trump was hurriedly escorted off the stage during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
MSNBC’s move to pull “Morning Joe” shocked political commentators, with some conservatives saying it showed one of the network’s most highly-watched programs could not be trusted to cover tense situations with discretion.
An MSNBC spokesperson strongly denied CNN’s report.
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Trump suffered an ear injury Assassin’s Bullet On Saturday, a gunman went on a rally in Pennsylvania, killing one protester and wounding two others before being shot dead by police. On Monday, Trump appeared at the Republican National Convention with a bandage over his right ear.
Fox News’ Brian Flood and David Latz contributed to this report.
