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The hosts of MSNBC’s Morning Joe are “very disappointed” that the network pulled the show off the schedule on Monday, what would have been the program’s first broadcast after Donald Trump was nearly killed at a campaign rally.
The morning news and commentary show had announced on Sunday that the following day’s broadcast would be preempted by breaking news coverage of the assassination attempt, raising eyebrows that the network’s influential and top-rated program was being sidelined at the beginning of a critical week, with emerging news of the attack and the opening of the Republican National Convention.
“We were told in no uncertain terms that on Sunday evening that there was going to be one news feed across all NBC channels … That we were going to stay as a network in breaking news mode,” host Joe Scarborough said on Tuesday as the show returned to air.
“That did not happen,” he said.
The network ended its breaking news coverage to cover the Republican National Convention and continued with regular news programming.
“We don’t know why that didn’t happen, our team was not given a good answer as to why that didn’t happen, but it didn’t happen,” Scarborough said. “We were also told it was going to happen throughout the day. I guess after there was such strong blowback after yesterday morning I guess they changed their plans. And so those plans changed as well. It didn’t.”
He said they were “very surprised” and “very disappointed” by the decision.
“If we had known there was going to the one news feed from NBC News across all NBC news channels … we obviously would have been in yesterday morning,” he added. “We all wish we would have been here yesterday. We still are, we’d like to figure out why there wasn’t that news feed.”
In a statement on Sunday, a spokesperson for NBCUniversal News Group announced that the NBC News, NBC News Now and MSNBC would “continue to cross simulcast, alternating between NBC News, NBC News NOW and ‘MSNBC Reports,’ so there is one news feed covering this developing situation.”
“Next time we’re told there’s going to be a news feed replacing us, we will be in our chairs,” Scarborough said on Tuesday. “The news feed will be us, or they can get someone else to host the show.”
Scarborough and co-host Mika Brzezinski also recently pushed back at their bosses on-air after NBC News had announced former Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel would be joining the network as a political analyst.
During a broadcast in March, Brzezinski said she hoped the network “reconsiders its decision.”
“To be clear, we believe NBC News should seek out conservative Republican voices to provide balance in their election coverage, but it should be conservative Republicans, not a person who used her position of power to be an anti-democracy election denier,” she added. “We hope NBC will reconsider its decision. It goes without saying that she will not be a guest on Morning Joe in her capacity as a paid contributor.”
Morning Joe has been a staple in the White House during Trump’s administration and under President Joe Biden, who called into the program last week to defend his candidacy in the 2024 election.
