Joe Scarborough, co-host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” criticized Democratic strategist David Axelrod on Wednesday for continuing to publicly criticize President Biden — while the president says he is committed to staying in the race.
Scarborough and co-host Mika Brzezinski rebuked Biden’s critics on their newscast and defended the president for occasionally stumbling over his words.
“He messed up a word or two,” Scarborough said of Biden’s comments on Sunday, adding that these little flaws happen to everyone all the time — even apparently to Axelrod, who, Scarborough noted, seemed mix two names while criticizing Biden for doing something similar.
“By the way, it’s really funny. David Axelrod, a few nights ago, was walking by when Joe Biden spoke on Sunday night, he cut out a word,” Scarborough said. “And David Axelrod, of course, had to bring that up.”
“And then he got someone’s name wrong,” Brzezinski interrupted.
“And then you get someone’s name wrong,” Scarborough repeated. “So David Axelrod needs to leave TV? I mean, it happens. Media people continue: ‘Oh, Joe Biden mixed up names.’ Then they throw it to someone and mix up the name.”
“We know we do this,” Brzezinski said.
“We do a lot,” Scarborough added.
Axelrod, who served as a senior White House adviser to then-President Obama, has been a prominent voice among Democrats calling on the president to step aside and let someone else take his place at the top of the Democratic ticket.
Scarborough has been one of Biden’s fiercest defenders, but after Biden’s difficult debate performance, the expert publicly raised doubts that Biden could be re-elected. He also criticized the president’s performance, saying, “Donald Trump has lied repeatedly, and Joe Biden has failed to respond to any of those lies.”
“We’ve been asking, ‘Why is this race close? We have no idea why this race is close. We saw last night why this race is close and why I fear Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States unless things change,” Scarborough said on his show the morning after the debate.
Scarborough acknowledged that he raised these concerns shortly after the debate, but said the time for such change has passed.
“The day after the debate, I said he needed to consider resigning. I said, let’s wait a few days, see what happens, see where this goes,” Scarborough said, adding that the polls haven’t changed significantly in recent weeks despite Biden’s poor debate performance and despite pressure from “elitist billionaires ”. and public figures to quit.
“Call all the most powerful people, in politics, in the media, and try to remove the guy from the ticket. You can do it. You’ve been trying to do this for three weeks. Is not working. He’s saying he’s not going anywhere. And if you look at the poll numbers, you see the people who actually respond to those polls,” Scarborough said. “These people are saying, ‘You know what? We’re good with a guy from Delaware. We’re fine with the state school guy. They were good.’ That’s what they’re saying now.”
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
