Mika Brzezinski apologized Friday on “Morning Joe” after calling Mike Pompeo a “butt-boy” for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman after the Secretary of State defended him on “Fox & Friends” earlier this week.
“The term is crass and offensive and I apologize to everyone, especially the LGBTQ community and to my colleagues for using it. It was a mistake,” Brzezinski said. “But I just wanted to say on camera, looking the viewers straight in the eye, I am really, really sorry.”
The “Morning Joe” host added that her late father — former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski — would have found the remarks “unbecoming and disrespectful,” and would have berated her as well.
It’s the second apology from Brzezinski for the remarks which metastasized quickly after first being uttered by her at the end of the show Wednesday.
During the broadcast, Brzezinski took issue with Pompeo’s continued defense of Bin Salman, even as an avalanche of evidence now says the royal was intimately involved in the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.
“Why doesn’t Mike Pompeo care right now?” Brzezinski demand. “Are the pathetic deflections that we just heard when he appeared on ‘Fox and Friends,’ is that a patriot speaking, or a wannabe dictator’s butt-boy? I’m dead serious. I’m asking, are these the words of a patriot?”
The issue blew up on Twitter and was fueled Thursday by both Brzezinski’s failure to appear on set (something Joe Scarborough said was due to a “long planned family event”) and President Trump’s decision to tweet his thoughts on the matter as well.
“If it was a Conservative that said what ‘crazed’ Mika Brzezinski stated on her show yesterday, using a certain horrible term, that person would be banned permanently from television,” Trump said. “She will probably be given a pass, despite their terrible ratings.”
Brzezinski’s apology and the weekend now likely will put the issue to rest.