Appearing Tuesday on MSNBC’s Hardball with host Chris Matthews, national security analyst Malcolm Nance compared supporters of President Donald Trump and Islamic State members, arguing they are “very similar.”
Nance, a former Naval intelligence operator who now peddles outlandish allegations of Trump-Russia collusion, made the comparison while on a panel discussing the House Democrats’ impeachment investigation into the president. Nance made the claim in response to his colleague, network contributor and Obama-era official Ned Price, who said President Trump’s inner circle will run “fast in the other direction” if it’s the politically opportune thing to do.
“I’ve seen a lot of phenomenon [sic] in my life. I’ve seen a lot of operations,” Nance responded. “You know, the behaviors that I am seeing here, and this is anecdotal, are very similar to the way that ISIS members are. They are true believers — and this is their reality and they will not surrender it. You know, they’re dead-enders.”
The comments received no pushback from Matthews, Price, or fellow panelist and Washington Post reporter Ashley Parker.
Conversely, as Matthews closed out the segment, the liberal host praised Nance for his thoughts, gushing: “Malcolm, I love your attitude. As we say in Philly, you got it. Thank you for coming on tonight.”
Nance has repeatedly pushed conspiracy theories on MSNBC’s airwaves, having previously suggested that so-called white supremacist “foot soldiers” are interpreting President Trump’s words as “subliminal orders in their head” in the wake of the deadly shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio.
“These people feel that they are the foot soldiers and executors of what the disenfranchisement that the white race is feeling, and Donald Trump is giving them subliminal orders in their head,” he said at the time. “They are no different than the mobilized, self-starting, self-radicalized terrorists of ISIS here in the United States and Europe, who take cars and drive down streets. It’s just that they have a permissive environment in which they can get firearms and go out and attack their perceived enemies.”
Nance made headlines this week for doubling down on MSNBC’s Joy Reid’s debunked claim that hackers planted anti-gay content on her former blog.
“I am a former cryptologist from the National Security Agency. If there is anything that I personally can assure you as an American citizen, it’s that there is nothing in this world that is digital that cannot be manipulated,” Nance told New Yorker over the weekend.
“Clearly there is a Discredit & Humiliate campaign afoot. Apparently all progressives are secretly anti-gay bloggers. This has Wikileaks & AltRight written all over it. Expect more” — he added. “Yeah, I stand by that.”