MSNBC host Joe Scarborough launched a furious rant at Republicans who are still backing Donald Trump after he was federally indicted, saying they are “narrowing down” their base to “insurrections, weirdos and freaks”.
On Monday’s episode of Morning Joe, Mr Scarborough passionately condemned Trump-allied Republicans who have remained loyal to the former president, despite his indictment on 37 counts related to the retention of classified documents last week.
“If they want to harbor a fugitive, politically, that like stole nuclear secrets, good luck you’re going to lose even more in 2024,” Mr Scarborough said.
Several allies of Mr Trump including Representatives Matt Gaetz (R - Florida), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R - Georgia), Elise Stefanik (R - New York), Andy Biggs (R - Arizona) and Senator Marco Rubio (R - Florida) all came to the former president’s defence when he was indicted last week.
Many of them claimed the indictment was an attempt to discredit Mr Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign as they downplayed the severity of the allegations.
But Mr Scarborough said their efforts to defend the former president were hurting their party more than helping.
“A lot of them are still too stupid to realize they’re just giving up 2024 by doing it,” he said.
The Morning Joe host cited a poll from YouGov and CBS that indicated 80 per cent of Americans believe it was a national security risk that Mr Trump allegedly kept military documents at his home in Mar-a-Lago.
Mr Scarborough argued that if the polls numbers are true, Mr Trump’s loyal defenders will end up pushing away Republican voters.
“You keep narrowing down your base until you have insurrectionists, weirdos and freaks,” Mr Scarborough said.
Raising his voice to a shout, he continued: “Everybody, look, you’re freaking out about what’s going on. Look at that number. That is us people who actually give a damn about a president of the United States who steals nuclear secrets and then lies about it to the FBI when the FBI tries to retrieve nuclear secrets.”
The indictment, which was unsealed on Friday (10 June) alleged that the former president had kept 31 documents containing information related to US national security among the many boxes of material that he allegedly refused to give the National Archives when he left office.
Some of those documents contained top secret information related to US nuclear weaponry and the nuclear capabilities of a foreign country.
