Willie Geist to Viewers After Trump’s Speech: ‘We’ve Been Fooled by the Pivot Many Times’
Last night, you would’ve been hard pressed to find many people in the political media orbit who weren’t giving President Donald Trump due credit for his optimistic joint address to Congress. Even CNN’s Van Jones remarked at the conclusion of the live event, “He became President of the United States.”
The opinions continued into this morning with Morning Joe panelists and cohosts alike praising many elements of Trump’s speech, in which the Commander in Chief touted new infrastructure ambitions and said, “The time for small thinking is behind us.” Willie Geist was among those crediting Trump for his ability to seemingly unite warring factions with his address from the speaker’s rostrum.
“There’s no question,” Geist began Wednesday morning, “this was a different presidential speech.”
The Morning Joe cohost continued, “There was nothing new at the center of it. It was the way it was delivered and the tone when he says, ‘We need to be empowered by our aspirations, not burdened by our fears.’ For a president who’s been accused of peddling fear and lying about the murder rate and all those things, for him to talk in a positive, optimistic, uplifting way was a totally different thing for him.”
But Geist cautioned that Trump has been down this road before, often appearing as if he is willing to make the almighty “pivot” before falling back into his old ways. “Now, the question is: does it stick? Is this one of these Trump moments where people go, ‘OK. He’s figured it out. This is the pivot. This is the change.'” Geist continued by reminding viewers, “We’ve been fooled by the pivot many times, many people have been.”
Watch above, via MSNBC.
[image via screengrab]
