‘Doesn’t Make Sense’: Morning Joe Panel Baffled by Continued GOP Support For Trump’s Love of Dictators

MSNBC’s Morning Joe covered Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to North Korea, courtesy of that country’s leader Kim Jong-un, and used it to remind viewers that these two dictators had a big fan in former President Donald Trump.

Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough described the “axis of evil” between Russia, North Korea, and China, but noted to presidential historian Jon Meacham that Trump “considers himself to be close friends with every one of those tyrants.” Meacham added that Trump, “by his own admission” admires authoritarian leaders like Putin and Kim, and that this should be troubling to “Reagan Republicans” planning to vote for Trump in November:

I would just say to all of my friends, and your friends too, who consider themselves Reagan Republicans — look at these images and explain to me, explain to us, why, somehow or another, it is in the American interest to support Vladimir Putin against American intelligence agencies, against American interests, against the long-standing, sometimes ambivalent, sometimes unsuccessful, sometimes contradictory, but persistent support of democracies around the world on the part of the United States. Our collective security after World War II was based on the idea that democracies tended not to go to war with each other. Autocracies tended to go to war against democracies. That is the pattern. And it doesn’t necessarily predict the future, but it’s a pretty good diagnostic guide. And if you want to understand the global stakes of what we’re facing, those are the images to show.

Scarborough then tried to put some context into what “Peter Millar Republicans” (referring to the golfing brand) are thinking about when they consider the choices for president:

Scarborough: You know, what’s so remarkable here, Jon Meacham, is that you look at Donald Trump’s words, and we’ve talked time and time again about the Peter Millar Republicans in the clubhouse sitting there, “Well, it’s Republican versus Democrat. And [President Joe Biden], he’s a socialist. How’s your 401K?” “Oh, making more money than ever! How’s your stocks?” “Oh, breaking records every day! But he’s a socialist, so you know, I’m just going to vote for the Republican.” Acting as if this is [Bob Dole] versus [Bill Clinton] in 1996. Let’s look at the words.

And, your friends and my friends, how do they justify the fact that they’re still considering voting for a guy who called [Chinese President Xi Jinping], the head of the Chinese Communist Party, who asked him at Mar-a-Lago, reportedly about building concentration camps for Uygers, and Trump offhandedly said, “Yeah, sure. Yeah. Sounds great.” Who called, he praised President Xi as being incredibly powerful with an iron fist, a brilliant guy with an iron fist, and respected the fact he had an iron fist and could repress over a billion of his citizens. He called Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Russia brilliant. Brilliant. I say that to all of your friends at the 19th hole, and my friends. And then, of course, went on and on about his love letters to Kim Jong-un, a man who is considered to be the most bloodthirsty communist tyrant on the face of the globe. This is who your friends, some of your friends, some of my friends, some of your family, some of my family and everybody on Fox News is supporting.

Meacham: It’s one of the great puzzles. And I mean this, I can argue the domestic side. I understand, I don’t agree with it, but I understand the taxes and judges argument for domestically supporting the Republican nominee, whoever it might be. And, boy, we have now tested, three times, whoever it might be. But this one doesn’t make sense to me.

Watch the video above via MSNBC.