Morning Joe Criticize Trump Defense Team For Telling ‘Blatant Lies’ In Front of Chief Justice Roberts

MSNBC Morning Joe‘s Joe Scarborough and Mike Barnicle criticized President Donald Trump’s defense team on Wednesday for telling “blatant lies” and “half-truths” in front of Chief Justice John Roberts, and predicted, “there’s going to be payback here at some point.”

“John Roberts is known for being a fair man, no matter what you think of the decisions that come from the court, he’s regarded as being a fair man who reveres the law,” declared Barnicle. “Elements of what we’re watching and witnessing, the nation is witnessing right now during this impeachment trial, it’s bound — parts of it — to go before the Supreme Court, and you just wonder what kind of an impact the lies the chief justice knew were being told right in front of him by the president’s defense team would impact his view of their case.”

“Yeah, and you know Mike, I’m glad you brought up Chief Justice Roberts. There are a lot of people on Twitter that want Chief Justice Roberts to slam his gavel down and be Matlock and go, ‘I just do declare here, this may be the law but it’s just not right.’ He’s not gonna do that!” replied Scarborough. “This is a guy who upheld Obamacare even though I’m sure ideologically it didn’t align with many of his beliefs about what the federal government should or shouldn’t do, and he upheld it because he’s an institutionalist first of all.”

“But secondly, I loved the line in there where he [Chief Justice Roberts] basically said, ‘Hey, don’t ask me to do something here on the Supreme Court that you can take care of at the ballot box.’ Well, in this case, you have duly-elected senators and the majority of those duly-elected senators that have put together the procedures for how this impeachment is going to run,” Scarborough continued. “They should not expect the John Roberts who deferred to the wisdom of the people in Obamacare, they should not expect that John Roberts to now step in and say, ‘You know what, I don’t like what the majority leader’s laid out as far as rules go. I’m going to change it.'”

“That said, Mike, when there are hearings that are across the street in his domain and not Mitch McConnell’s, I think these lies may have an impact…will have an impact on the bad faith that this White House shows and their lawyers show time and time again,” he added.

Barnicle responded, “You would think so, Joe, because it’s so blatant and repeated, not only by Pat Cipollone but nearly the entire crew of the president’s defense team. Blatant lies, blatant half-truths, mistruths just uttered in front of the chief justice of the United States. It’s going to have an impact, there’s going to be payback here at some point.”

Watch above via MSNBC.

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!