‘Mr. President I’ll Be Honest: I’m Scared!’ MSNBC’s Capehart Asks Biden Why Americans Shouldn’t Be Afraid For Democracy

MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart told President Joe Biden “Mr. President, I’ll be honest: I’m scared,” and asked why Americans should not fear for the state of our democracy.

On Friday, President Biden sat down for an exclusive interview with Capehart, which aired for the first time on Friday night’s edition of MSNBC’s The ReidOut.

After asking Biden about the January 6 subpoena that was just issued to Trump, Capehart cited what he described as a frightening political climate going into the midterms, and asked the president for some kind of reassurance.

Biden tried to thread the needle between acknowledging the “concern” and seeing a way through it:

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Mr. President, I’ll be honest: I’m scared. Millions of Americans are scared, and they’re concerned about the concerted attacks on democracy, on voting, and how that’s going to impact the midterm elections.

We’re seeing everything from Governor DeSantis’s election police force, arresting people for alleged violations of voter voter fraud. We’re seeing election workers quitting because of threats. And then on top of it, you’ve got election deniers up and down the ballot running for election. A good chunk of them could win.

So why shouldn’t we be scared?

PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: Well, I think we should be concerned. Look, there’s nothing automatic about democracy. Remember, when you’re in undergraduate school, I talk about every generation has to protect democracy.

Well it really does and I think we’re at one of those inflection points in history where we’ve reached a point where there has been such a division that you have what I call the Mega-MAGA Republicans who are, think that it’s all right to threaten violence, think it’s, that’s not inappropriate. Talk about how they are concerned about security.

But yet you saw what happened on January 6. The whole world saw it. And, but I think there’s reason for concern.

But I’m optimistic about two things. Number one, we’ve been here before. And, and I believe that the essence of who we are as a nation, the soul of our country, is really about our commitment to the basic fundamental elements that make us Americans, which is the idea of fairness, decency, honesty, and I think is baked in to majority of the American people.

And, and I think as long as we take seriously the threat, I don’t think the threat can come to fruition.

Watch above via MSNBC’s The ReidOut.