Joe Scarborough Hammers ‘Red States’ as ‘Most Violent’: ‘Send’ National Guard to ‘Mike Johnson’s District’

Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough hammered “red states” as the “most violent” in his takedown of President Donald Trump’s suggestion on Friday he may send National Guard troops to Chicago and New York City, as he has in Washington, D.C., as part of a crackdown on crime.

The tirade came on Monday morning’s show just days after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson openly pushed back on the president’s deployment threat, adding he was exploring legal options to block any such move.

As the Morning Joe crew reflected on Trump’s idea, Scarborough unloaded on the decision, defending New York City in particular as “one of the safest large cities” while comparing murder statistics there and in Chicago to “much higher” per capita figures for cities located in “red states.”

You know, the thing about this is, of course, we’ve talked about Washington, D.C., it’s the nation’s capital, a federal government, Congress could get involved, work with the president, and, together, as we’ve been talking about for a long time, figure out how to partner with the city. And that hasn’t happened. And now we’re talking about Chicago. We’re talking about New York City. Neither one of those cities are in the top ten for most violent cities in America.

Rounding on the numbers, the host then took aim at House Speaker Mike Johnson’s own district:

And if you want to look per capita, they need to do no more than look to Mike Johnson’s home state, the Speaker of the House, and look at violence per capita. You have a much higher chance of dying in Monroe, Louisiana, than you do Chicago, Illinois. A much higher chance of dying in Shreveport, Louisiana, than you do in Monroe. A much higher chance of dying in New Orleans, Louisiana, than you do in New York City.

I mean, New York, that’s fabulously crazy. New York City continues to rank as one of the safest large cities in America. And I don’t know that there’s a close second.

So, there are all of these cities and towns in red state America. You could look at Little Rock, Arkansas, you could look at Monroe, Louisiana, you could look at Shreveport, Louisiana. You could look at New Orleans, Louisiana. You could look at Memphis, Tennessee. You could look at one Nashville, Tennessee. You can look at one red state after another – Bessemer, Alabama – and you will see violent crime rates much, much, much higher per capita than Chicago, Illinois, San Francisco.

Throwing up a tweet of California Governor Gavin Newsom’s criticism of the move, Scarborough read it aloud and continued:

The chance of having violent acts committed upon you in Mike Johnson’s Louisiana, in red state Louisiana, red state that Donald Trump carried and every Republican has carried since Bill Clinton, the chances of being murdered in Louisiana 400 times higher than in California.

Let me say that again. Let me underline that again: You have a 400% higher chance of being murdered in red state Louisiana, Mike Johnson’s home state, than you do on the left coast in Gavin Newsom’s California.

There is no emergency. There is no logic to Chicago, to San Francisco, if you’re looking at the numbers, if you’re looking at data, I don’t even think this Supreme Court can turn a blind eye to this. They just can’t because data is data. Numbers are numbers, and the numbers are clear. And the numbers don’t justify – no emergency!

The host began calling on Trump to send the troops “to red states where they need them” and listed out all the cities he’d flagged statistics for:

Send those troops to Shreveport, Louisiana. Send them to Mike Johnson’s district. Send them to Little Rock, Arkansas. Send them to Memphis and Nashville, Tennessee. Send them to red states where they need them.

Watch above via MSNBC.