Even by Donald Trump’s admittedly low standards, his trashing of MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski on Thursday morning was one of his most outrageous moments to date. In case you missed it, just minutes after Brzezinski called him out on “Morning Joe,” Trump claimed that he wouldn’t let Brzezinski and her co-host/fiancé, Joe Scarborough, spend New Year’s at Mar-a-Lago because she was “bleeding badly” from botched plastic surgery.
Now who would even think such an outrageously sexist statement was something that was even worth defending? Well, apparently the White House press office did. Deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders spent the day trying–and failing–to convince us that Trump was the real victim.
Sanders thought she would have a receptive audience when she dropped by Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom” to launch the White House defense of Trump’s outrageous tweets. But she was in for a surprise. Watch here.
@SarahHuckabee told @BillHemmer: "I don't think that the President has ever been someone who gets attacked and doesn't push back." pic.twitter.com/jR2pubyTQd
— America's Newsroom (@AmericaNewsroom) June 29, 2017
Sanders told host Bill Hemmer that Trump is not someone who “gets attacked and doesn’t push back.” She claimed that Trump was merely defending himself from the latest in “an outrageous number of personal attacks” directed at himself and his staff. She herself claims that Brzezinski and Scarborough have gone after her a number of times. As Sanders saw it, Trump was merely putting the nation on notice that he “fights fire with fire,” and was not going to let the “liberal media and the liberal elites within the media” bully him with impunity.
Hemmer wasn’t buying it. He asked an obvious question–“But is that necessary?” Sanders replied that it was, claiming that Trump had a right to “push back” against “unnecessary” attacks on himself and his staffers. If Sanders thought that would be enough for Hemmer to back off, she was dead wrong. Hemmer said that Trump’s response was “entirely more personal than it needs to be.”
A number of Republican lawmakers were of the same mind.
Mr. President, your tweet was beneath the office and represents what is wrong with American politics, not the greatness of America.
— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) June 29, 2017
Please just stop. This isn't normal and it's beneath the dignity of your office.
— Ben Sasse (@BenSasse) June 29, 2017
This has to stop – we all have a job – 3 branches of gov’t and media. We don’t have to get along, but we must show respect and civility.
— Sen. Susan Collins (@SenatorCollins) June 29, 2017
On the President's tweets this morning → pic.twitter.com/tJJqsV8KCb
— Sen. James Lankford (@SenatorLankford) June 29, 2017
This is not okay. As a female in politics I am often criticized for my looks. We should be working to empower women. https://t.co/sV6WDE0EUD
— Lynn Jenkins (@RepLynnJenkins) June 29, 2017
Americans agree we must work to build a better politics in our country; free of personal attacks & vitriol. Leaders must set the example
— Carlos Curbelo (@carloslcurbelo) June 29, 2017
Personal attacks & character assassination yield a culture of social & political violence in which people can become radicalized & dangerous
— Carlos Curbelo (@carloslcurbelo) June 29, 2017
Let's all remember the lessons from the Congressional shooting just a couple weeks ago. We must treat one another with decency & respect
— Carlos Curbelo (@carloslcurbelo) June 29, 2017
It should have occurred to Sanders that if a Fox News host and several Republican lawmakers weren’t buying her line, it probably wasn’t going to work. But apparently it didn’t. She kept it up during Thursday’s press briefing. C-SPAN got a clip.
When asked if she thought Trump went too far, Sanders replied that Trump had been “attacked mercilessly” on “Morning Joe,” and had every right to fight back. She scoffed at the outrage over Trump’s tweets when “Morning Joe” had supposedly attacked him and a number of White House staffers–including herself–in a “very deeply personal” manner.
In response to criticism from his own party that the tweets were beneath the dignity of the presidency, Sanders claimed that Trump upholds his office by pushing forward with his agenda. However, she warned the “liberal media” and “Hollywood elites” that if they attack him, “he’s going to hit back.”
Later, Sanders claimed that Trump was merely doing what the American people elected him to do–fight for them, every day.
“Look, the American people elected a fighter. They didn’t elect somebody to sit back and do nothing. They knew what they were getting when the voted for Donald Trump, and he won overwhelmingly.”
Um, Sarah? He lost the popular vote by almost three million votes. But I digress. Even if you buy that Trump is doing what he was elected to do (and he isn’t) and even if you buy that Mika was bullying him (and she wasn’t), there is no defensible reason to respond in such a blatantly sexist and degrading manner.
I say this as someone who is half North Jerseyan, and has a bit of street fighter in him. I’m also a domestic violence survivor who was married for three years to an emotionally abusive and controlling woman. But does that give me the right to use sexist and misogynistic language in speaking out about her? No, no, never.
It’s tempting to feel some sympathy for Sanders. After all, on the face of it, she was painted into a corner. Just minutes before Trump weighed in, White House social media chief Dan Scavino got in a dig at the “Morning Joe” couple.
#DumbAsARockMika and lover #JealousJoe are lost, confused & saddened since @POTUS @realDonaldTrump stopped returning their calls! Unhinged.
— Dan Scavino Jr. (@DanScavino) June 29, 2017
And Melania Trump essentially cut the legs out from her anti-bullying campaign when, through a spokeswoman, she said that her husband was merely keeping his vow to “punch back 10 times harder” when he was attacked.
But then I noticed that Sanders has two sons and a daughter. What mother with any kind of love for her sons would be okay with her sons talking to a woman in this way? Most of my more conservative lady friends would take away their sons’ phones and computer/television privileges if they used the kind of language Trump used. And what mother wouldn’t be outraged at hearing any boy talk to her daughter in this manner? By defending Trump’s slagging of Mika, Sanders has effectively told every parent in this country that this sort of thing is acceptable, even if it’s supposedly in self-defense.
So now we have a White House where using outrageous and sexist language in the name of defending yourself is standard operating procedure. If this is making America great again, we should all be shuddering.
(featured image courtesy Sanders’ Twitter)