“Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough called out the “extraordinarily stupid” level of security at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner after this year’s event was interrupted by an armed gunman.
“It just seems extraordinarily stupid to use an open hotel and get State of the Union-type concentration of power in the United States, especially at a time of war against a country that’s been the epicenter of terrorism since 1979,” Scarborough explained Monday morning. “[To] have them walking around, going in and out of parties, standing to get their pictures taken before they go in, it’s never made sense to me. It’s never made sense to [co-host] Mika [Brzezinski].”
This year’s WHCA dinner was held, once again, in the Hilton hotel in Washington, D.C., as is tradition. While Scarborough acknowledged the historical precedent of the dinner’s venue, he argued that something needs to be changed so that the event is no longer conducted in such an “unsecure place.”
“It’s always been that way, but just because it’s always been that way doesn’t mean it needs to be that way ever again,” Scarborough said. “Anybody that has been there understands. You aren’t securing the entire hotel. You’re not checking people’s bags. You’re not doing the basic things that would be done like at the State of the Union address.”
“I just can’t think of a dumber place to have this than at the Washington Hilton,” Scarborough continued. “I know it’s history, but history be damned when you’re putting your Secretary of Defense, you’re putting your FBI Director, you’re putting the Secretary of Treasury, you’re putting the Vice President, you’re putting the President [all in one place].”
The “Morning Joe” host additionally called out the MAGA figures who used the shooting at the event to publicly call for finishing the construction of President Trump‘s proposed, widely derided White House Ballroom, which is currently under construction.
“How crazy that, like, everybody in MAGA-sphere all, like, within three seconds started posting the same post, right? That was so coordinated about the ballroom,” Scarborough observed. “This event .. will never be held in the White House because it is not about the White House. It is about the correspondents!”
You can watch the full “Morning Joe” segment yourself in the video above.
