“Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough found the perfect opportunity Tuesday morning to roast his co-host and wife Mika Brzezinski on the air when she expressed some concerns about ICE agents potentially scanning her bags in place of TSA workers at the airport.
“The Trump administration is putting ICE agents in airports across the country,” Brzezinski reported at the top of the segment, before asking, “What do they do to make the lines shorter, the ICE agents? What is their function? Do we know?” Later, the “Morning Joe” host reiterated her previous point, telling her fellow panelists, “I still don’t know what they’re doing there. What’s the function of them? Are they scanning our bags? I wouldn’t want that.”
“What’s in your bag?” Scarborough suddenly asked, cutting in and causing fellow “Morning Joe” anchors Jonathan Lemire and Willie Geist to burst into laughter. “She walked right into it!” Scarborough said, joking, “My bag? Open it up, man!” In her defense, Brzezinski clarified, telling viewers, “I wouldn’t want [ICE] scanning bags. I want TSA agents scanning bags!”
Her clarification did not stop Scarborough and co. from continuing to poke fun at her over her remarks, even going so far as to show a photo of Brzezinski’s carry-on bag on-air. “What are you hiding, Mika?” Geist asked at one point, prompting his “Morning Joe” co-host to proclaim, “We could go through it. I’d be happy to!”
Amid all the laughter, Scarborough did take a moment to explain why Trump’s airport deployment of ICE agents is such a “bad idea for everybody involved.”
“You remember the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup [commercials]? Two great tastes that go great together? … This is two horrible political stories that are bound together by Republicans!” Scarborough argued. “You have long lines at airports and then you have ICE, which is the personification of the Republican Party’s meltdown on mass deportation and immigration.”
“I can’t even believe it. Republicans are putting those two stories together!” the “Morning Joe” host exclaimed. Minutes later, near the end of the segment, Scarborough expressed his sympathy for the TSA workers sidelined by the ongoing, partial DHS shutdown, remarking, “All you can do is just thank every one of them.”
Sensing another opportunity to tease his wife, he demonstrated how he thanks TSA workers when he goes to the airport, telling his co-hosts, “I thank them. I go, ‘Hey, I want to thank you. Listen, let me tell you,’ and I’m hoping Mika, with her Johnny Depp blow bag, will run behind and make it to Miami. Make the drop.”
By the end of it, all Brzezinski could do was react with a horrified, defeated, “Oh, my God.” You can watch the full “Morning Joe” segment yourself above.
