MSNBC’s Joy Reid did not just dislike Republican Sen. Tim Scott’s rebuttal to President Joe Biden’s address this week to Congress.
She said it was “disappointing.” Reid also said she was “surprised,” “shocked,” and even a little “embarrassed” for the black senator from South Carolina.
“I was surprised,” said Reid. “This was standard Republican pabulum. This could have been delivered by Tom Cotton or Mike Lee.”
The MSNBC host then focused on the line in Scott’s speech that appears to have upset Democrats the most, the part where he asserted, “America is not a racist country.”
“Today,” said the Republican lawmaker, “kids again are being taught that the color of their skin defines them, and if they look a certain way, they’re an oppressor. From colleges to corporations to our culture, people are making money and gaining power by pretending we haven’t made any progress at all, by doubling down on the divisions we’ve worked so hard to heal.”
Scott added, “You know this stuff is wrong. Hear me clearly: America is not a racist country. It’s backwards to fight discrimination with different types of discrimination. And it’s wrong to try to use our painful past to dishonestly shut down debates in the present.”
Reid was distraught.
“I’m not sure what his purpose was,” she said. Reid then misquoted the senator, claiming he said “there’s no racism here” (he said exactly the opposite).
“I’m not sure what his purpose was,” the host said. “His audience, to me, appeared to be conservative white Republicans who are angry over certain things, of cancel culture and the same sort of cultural nods that we hear on Fox News. And he was out here to throw them a lifeline. It was disappointing.”
Reid misquoted Scott for a second time, claiming he spread outright falsehoods regarding Georgia’s new voting laws.
“He came out and lied about the Georgia bill, saying, ‘It’s easier to vote in Georgia than in New York,’” she asserted.
This is not what Scott said. He said it “will be easier to vote early in Georgia than in Democrat-run New York.” He is correct.
“I am — I am shocked and a bit embarrassed for him,” Reid concluded, adding the senator missed his chance to address his real passion: criminal justice reform. “This was a lost opportunity. Tim Scott had an opportunity to make his mark on criminal justice reform, and this isn’t going to do it. This wasn’t it.”
Her MSNBC colleague, former Republican strategist and full-time know-nothing Nicolle Wallace, concurred with this overall assessment.
“This is a speech delivered from a planet where facts don’t matter, which is where the current Republican Party resides, so it’s not really [Scott’s] fault,” Wallace said.
Speaking of facts, not a single person on the MSNBC panel challenged Reid’s repeated mischaracterization of Scott’s address. Not a one.
