MSNBC host Rachel Maddow on Monday blasted NBC News for hiring former Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel.
“I want to associate myself with all my colleagues, both at MSNBC and at NBC News, who have voiced loud and principled objections to our company putting on the payroll someone who hasn’t just attacked us as journalists, but someone who is part of an ongoing project to get rid of our system of government,” Maddow said in her monologue. “Someone who still is trying to convince Americans that this election stuff, it doesn’t really work. That this last election, it wasn’t a real result. That American elections are fraudulent.”
Maddow noted that MSNBC leadership did not initially object to McDaniel’s hiring.
“But when the hiring was announced, and MSNBC staff essentially unanimously and instantly expressed outrage, our leadership at MSNBC heard us, understood, and adjusted course. We were told this weekend in clear terms Ronna McDaniel will not be on our air. Ronna McDaniel will not be on MSNBC,” she said.
Maddow said McDaniel being on the payroll at NBC News is “inexplicable.”
“You wouldn’t hire a made man like a mobster to work at a D.A.’s office, right? You wouldn’t hire a pick-pocket to work as a TSA screener,” she said. “So I find the decision to put her on the payroll inexplicable, and I hope they will reverse their decision.”
Maddow joined a growing chorus of MSNBC and NBC News hosts criticizing the move.
“NBC News is, either wittingly or unwittingly, teaching election deniers that what they can do stretches well beyond appearing on our air and interviews to peddle lies about the sanctity and integrity of our elections,” MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace said Monday.
Fellow host Mika Brzezinski on Monday said she welcomes conservative Republican voices “but it should be conservative Republicans, not a person who used her position of power to be an anti-democracy election denier.”
NBC News host Chuck Todd during an appearance on Sunday’s “Meet the Press” following an interview with McDaniel, told anchor Kristen Welker that “our bosses owe you an apology for putting you in that situation.”
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