MSNBC’s Velshi Reacts to Trump Presser: He’s ‘Owning’ That His Ideas Are ‘Attractive to White Nationalists and Racists’

 

MSNBC host Ali Velshi said President Donald Trump’s recent comments questioning the citizenship of minority progressive congresswoman crossed into new racist territory for his administration, in which he is “owning” the support of open racists.

Velshi made the comments on Monday while co-hosting with Stephanie Ruhle, who called Trump’s attacks on the women “stunning,” given that they haven’t even been in Congress for more than a year yet, and noted that just “four out of 280” Republican lawmakers have condemned the president’s racist remarks so far.

“In covering all of this the way we have covered the last two and a half years, this actually feels different to me. this feels like the president is really owning the idea that he’s saying things that are attractive to white nationalists and racists,” Velshi said.

Ruhle and Velshi went on to argue that they do not expect GOP lawmakers to stand up to the president in this case, given that many of them spent the last few years failing to condemn “birtherism” conspiracies against former President Barack Obama, as well as Trump’s other racist controversies in the White House and on the campaign trail, like his commentary on “shithole countries,” “Mexican judge,” and “rapists and murders”

In a Twitter tirade on Sunday morning, Trump wrote that it is “so interesting to see ‘Progressive’ Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run.”

Watch above, via MSNBC.

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

Tags:

Caleb Ecarma was a reporter at Mediaite. Email him here: caleb@mediaite.com Follow him on Twitter here: @calebecarma