“Morning Joe” co-host Joe Scarborough scolded Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos for “bowing” to Donald Trump on Monday, after his paper declined to endorse Kamala Harris for president.
Scarborough said the paper’s decision was nothing more than “anticipatory kowtowing” to Trump, who the host said was “going to be an autocrat” if he makes it back into the White House. His co-host and wife Mike Brzezinski agreed.
“As billionaires are running The Washington Post, the New York Times, running X, all this peremptory bowing to Donald Trump. I have to say, this is just me; you can be upset about that, but if I’m running against that guy and those three billionaires … Whew! It is going to be a fun final nine days,” Scarborough said.
His comments come after The Post’s editorial page said on Friday it would not endorse a presidential candidate in the 2024 election. This was the first time since 1988 that the paper hadn’t endorsed the Democratic candidate for president.
“The Washington Post will not be making an endorsement of a presidential candidate in this election,” Post publisher William Lewis said. “Nor in any future presidential election. We are returning to our roots of not endorsing presidential candidates.”
Bezos, who founded Amazon and owns the paper, has not publicly backed Republican nominee Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 race. Status reported last week that some Washington Post employees believe Bezos didn’t want to alienate Trump by having the paper officially endorse a candidate.
Four years ago, Bezos celebrated Joe Biden and Harris winning in an Instagram post, saying their victory showed “unity, empathy and decency are not characteristics of a bygone era.”
The Post’s non-endorsement came a few days after The Los Angeles Times said it would not be endorsing a candidate. Since then, both papers have been skewered by many readers and left-leaning pundits for declining to endorse Harris.
On Monday, Scarborough said the recent news at the Post and Times shows “it’s the billionaires versus us.”
“We can win,” he added. “They can have their billions and buy their newspapers, but we the people can have the final word.”
Leave a Reply