Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” host Joe Scarborough likened President Donald Trump’s criticisms of the press to the acts of Chinese communist revolutionary Mao Zedong and Soviet revolutionary Joseph Stalin, both of whom were responsible for mass atrocities.
Scarborough said, “Of all the things, the shocking things, the president has said, and he’s said so many, channeling Chairman Mao and Joseph Stalin by calling the media an enemy of the people. Saying that First Amendment rights, saying the ability of newspapers to write what they want to write is quote ‘disgusting’ and someone should look into it, maybe the most frightening of all and the most disgusting. And again, we are starting to hear people talking more and more about the 25th Amendment. Steve Bannon, warning the president that is what will remove him from office, if anything, removes him from office, Tom Barrack, his long-time friend saying he is shocked and stunned by what he’s seen from Donald Trump. And Bob Corker saying — we could add all of this up and now you have a president who is actually dismissing the most sacred right Americans have had since 1787, the right of free speech.”
Willie Geist added, “This is authoritarianism 101. You delegitimize the press, you delegitimize your opponents, and then you try to destroy them.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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