WATCH: MSNBC’s Steve Schmidt Stuns Ari Melber After Claiming Fly on Mike Pence’s Head is ‘Mark of the Devil’

Steve Schmidt, a former George W. Bush and John McCain staffer who has since become a prominent anti-Trump critic and founder of the Lincoln Project, stunned MSNBC’s Ari Melber after claiming the fly that landed on Vice President Mike Pence’s head during Wednesday’s debate was a “mark of the devil.”

“I don’t think it’s ever a good sign when a fly lands on your head for two minutes,” declared Schmidt on MSNBC. “You know that’s a sign all through the history of sin, and historically, biblically.”

“You know a fly, he who commands the fly, has always been seen historically as the mark of the devil,” Schmidt went on.

Melber quickly shot back, “Well Steve, now as a journalist, now I have to ask for the record, are you joking? Because the fly could have landed on anyone.”

“Yes, but it didn’t. It landed on Mike Pence, and it says something,” Schmidt claimed. “Something karmic about the status of the campaign.”

As Schmidt then quickly moved on to election poll numbers, Melber concluded, “I’ll just say in my role on the fact check what Steve Schmidt has said about the numbers is true. What he said about the ultimate moral reckoning of whether the fly connotes evil or devil or Nosferatu is above my pay grade.”

Watch above via MSNBC.