Exasperated MSNBC Pundit Says ‘We Can’t Just Keep Reciting the Same Talking Points’ During Second Trump Term

MSNBC’s Charlie Sykes implored opponents of President-elect Donald Trump to try a new tack of opposition ahead of a second term.

Trump will be sworn in again on Monday when Republicans will have full control of the government for at least the next two years.

Sykes appeared on Friday’s Deadline: White House, where host Nicolle Wallace asked about this week’s Senate confirmation hearing for Secretary of Defense nominee Pete Hegseth. Hegseth has been plagued by a series of allegations of rape, workplace drunkenness, and marital infidelity. Hegseth denies the first two allegations and it appears he has the backing of enough Republicans to be confirmed.

“What does success look like if Republicans, to a person, are more afraid of a mean tweet from Donald Trump than someone with a record of appearing on the air and at work drunk, taking female staffers to strip clubs, an allegation of rape?” Wallace said. “What what does success look like if one of the two parties is more afraid of Trump than putting that person in charge of every man and woman in the military?”

“Well, that is the world that we live in,” Sykes replied. “And we’re seeing this on display right now. I mean, the fact that somebody like a Joni Ernst would roll over and cave in on Pete Hegseth is an indication of that.”

He later added:

So, I do think that this was one of those lessons that that, you know, we all have to be better at this. We just can’t keep reciting the same talking points. We can’t use the same jargon. We can’t just simply assume that because a person is a bad character, they will be rejected. We have to make it very, very clear to the American people what this means to them, what it means to their lives and the lives of their children.

Watch above MSNBC.