Joy Reid campaigns for Iran to get 'nuclear energy' in cringe-worthy panel appearance
Fired ex-MSNBC host Joy Reid mistakenly blasted the US for trying to stop Iran obtaining nuclear energy during her latest CNN appearance.
Speaking on Newsnight earlier this week, Reid defended the country following the attacks on their nuclear sites by President Donald Trump over the weekend.
The left-wing commentator said: 'Why on earth is the United States bombing a country that did not attack us, what on earth are we doing there at all.
'Why is it there is this arrogance in the west and in the United States to say that we get to decide who can have nuclear energy.'
Trump's bunker buster bombing campaign was actually aimed at stopping Iran from developing nuclear weapons, not nuclear power.
Reid then added: 'The bottom line here is the way we know that Iran did not have nuclear weapons, if they had nuclear weapons Israel would not have attacked them.
'The reason they're trying to get nukes is because an expansionist power in their region keeps threatening them and actually bomb[ing] them.'
CNN host Abby Phillip interrupted, saying: 'Joy, this is not just about nukes. It's also about Iran being a state sponsor of terrorism and chaos and violence and death around the world.'
The panel then decided into chaos over her remarks, with attorney Arthur Aidala slamming her for backing Iran.
He said: 'Joy the fact that you are backing a country that slaughters homosexuals, that slaughters people for their religious beliefs. It's crazy, it's nuts.'
In response, she said that LGBTQ people weren't allowed to serve in the US military under President Trump.
Trump has banned transgender service personnel, but gays, lesbians and bisexuals are free to serve.
Clearly angered, Aidala continued: 'But they can live, they can get married they can have children. We're not killing them!'
U.S. stealth bombers dropped 12 deep penetrator bombs, called bunker busters, on the Fordo nuclear facility and two on the Natanz site over the weekend.
Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailed the attack as a success, but a US intelligence report has since emerged that seems to discredit that.
According to the preliminary report, it was found that Iran's nuclear program had been set back only a few months.
At a Pentagon briefing on Thursday, defense officials laid out details that bolstered their argument that the attack had wiped out the key sites.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said: 'You want to call it destroyed, you want to call it defeated, you want to call it obliterated, This was an historically successful attack.'
Reid's remarks this week come after she said she was disillusioned with the Democratic party to the point she was just 'hanging on'.
She told The Breakfast Club podcast on Tuesday that she believes the current Democrat line-up is fueling Trump's agenda by failing to provide opposition.
'I've been a Democrat since I was old enough to vote, but I'm barely hanging on,' Reid told The Breakfast Club podcast on Tuesday.
'At this point, the party is not bigger than the future of my kids. I have three children, that have to live in this country as black people, and fascism doesn't work for me.
'I'm not willing to cede the country to Trumpism and MAGA simply because I'm clinging to this party.'
Reid added that the party desperately needs a new leader, and a fresh ideology. She blasted Trump as having 'no actual talent' - but he still beat the Democrats.
'You have to blow up the whole Democratic Party,' she said.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Reuters
19 minutes ago
- Reuters
Following NATO summit, Trump and Europe still at odds over Putin's ambitions
THE HAGUE, June 26 (Reuters) - For U.S. President Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin is a man looking for an off-ramp to his bloody three-year assault on Ukraine. But according to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, the Russian leader may be just getting started. If the alliance does not invest in its defense capabilities, Rutte warned the annual NATO summit on Tuesday, Russia could attack an alliance country within three years. By most measures, this year's NATO summit in The Hague was a success. Member states largely agreed to a U.S. demand to boost defense spending to 5% of gross domestic product. Trump, who once derided the alliance as a "rip-off," said his view had changed, while a budding bromance blossomed between him and Rutte, who compared the U.S. president to a stern "daddy" managing his geopolitical underlings. But the summit, which ended on Wednesday, also highlighted the widening gap between how the U.S. and Europe see the military ambitions of Russia, the bloc's main foil. That is despite some lawmakers in Trump's own Republican Party hardening their rhetoric in recent weeks, arguing that while the president's ambition to negotiate an end to Russia's war in Ukraine is laudable, it is now clear that Putin is not serious about coming to the table. In a Wednesday press conference, Trump conceded that it was "possible" Putin had territorial ambitions beyond Ukraine. But he insisted that the Russian leader - buffeted by manpower and materiel losses - wanted the war to end quickly. "I know one thing: He'd like to settle," Trump said. "He'd like to get out of this thing. It's a mess for him." Secretary of State Marco Rubio echoed Trump's view in a sideline interview with Politico, saying the U.S. was holding off on expanding its sanctions against Moscow, in part to keep talks going. "If we did what everybody here wants us to do - and that is come in and crush them with more sanctions - we probably lose our ability to talk to them about the ceasefire," he said. The message from others at the summit was starkly different. A senior NATO official told reporters in a Tuesday briefing that Putin was not in fact interested in a ceasefire - or in engaging in good-faith talks at all. "Regardless of battlefield dynamics, we continue to doubt that Russia has any interest in meaningful negotiations," the official said. Russia's ambitions, the senior official said, go beyond control of "certain territories at their administrative lines," as Rubio put it. Putin is instead bent on imposing his "political will" on neighboring states. Rutte put the Russian threat in existential terms. "If we do not invest now," he said on Tuesday, "we are really at risk that the Russians might try something against NATO territory in three, five or seven years." The U.S. is not the only NATO member with a more optimistic view of Russia. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a longtime Trump ally and critic of European institutions, said Russia was "not strong enough to represent a real threat to NATO." Still, as the alliance's largest contributor and most powerful member, Washington's position is a central preoccupation in most NATO capitals. The White House, asked for comment, referred to Trump's comments at the Wednesday press conference. In response to a request for comment, a separate NATO official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, disputed that there were differing assessments within the alliance, pointing to a NATO declaration on Wednesday which referenced the "long-term threat posed by Russia." The Russian embassy in Washington referred to Thursday comments by Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, who criticized NATO for wasting money on defense. "It seems that only by invoking the fabricated 'Russian threat' will it be possible to explain to ordinary people why their pockets are being emptied once again," she said. The U.S. State Department and the Ukrainian embassy in Washington did not respond to requests for comment. The lack of a common understanding about Putin's goals will complicate future diplomatic plans to wind down the war, said Philippe Dickinson, the deputy director of the Transatlantic Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council and a former British diplomat. "To reach a peace agreement, it's not just something that Trump and Putin can agree themselves," Dickinson said. "There does need to be European involvement. That needs to mean that there is some sort of sharing of views among allies on what Putin is trying to achieve." European leaders likely have not given up on trying to change Trump's views on Russia, Dickinson said. But they were always unlikely bring up thorny conversations at the NATO summit. The alliance's main goal was to simply get through it without major blowups, he said, an aim that was accomplished. Still, peace came at a cost - the lack of substantive discussion around Ukraine and Russia, he argued, was conspicuous. "The lack of a Russia strategy is a real glaring omission from what the summit could have produced," Dickinson said.
The Independent
36 minutes ago
- The Independent
Pete Hegseth attacks old Fox News colleague's reporting on Iran strikes intelligence evaluation
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth criticized his former Fox News colleague Jennifer Griffin as 'about the worst, the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says' in a Pentagon news conference Thursday. Griffin, Fox's chief national security correspondent, said that 'I take issue with that' and defended her reporting on the U.S. bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities. Hegseth, a Fox News anchor before President Donald Trump appointed him defense secretary, repeatedly criticized the media and questioned its patriotism for its reporting on an initial assessment of the weekend's bombing that questioned how much damage was done to Iran's nuclear program. The attack on Griffin was notable because, less than a year ago, she and Hegseth shared the same employer — a news network that has seen its reputation in Trump's eyes rise and fall haphazardly over the past decade. Griffin had asked Hegseth about whether there was any certainty that highly enriched uranium was stored at the mountain bunker bombed by the U.S., given satellite photos that showed more than a dozen trucks were seen there two days in advance. 'Of course, we're watching every single aspect,' Hegseth said. 'But, Jennifer, you've been about the worst, the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says.' Fox management had no immediate comment on what Hegseth said. Fox analyst Brit Hume called it an attack she did not deserve. 'Her professionalism, her knowledge and her experience are unmatched,' Hume said. Hume did seem to criticize, however, other news organizations for reporting on the initial assessment by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency. 'It is typical of the media in our age that any negative report that you can put your hands on in the aftermath of the United States military action is going to be highlighted, played up and so,' he said, saying it was disappointing. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Thursday that the administration is investigating who is responsible for leaking a copy of the intelligence agency's report. The news reporting clearly angered Trump, since the report's initial conclusions contradicted the president's statements that the bombing resulted in 'total obliteration' of Iran 's nuclear program. For a second day, the administration focused its anger on CNN reporter Natasha Bertrand who helped break the story. CNN, which said Wednesday that it stood 100% behind Bertrand's journalism, continued to defend her Thursday and said its reporting on the Trump administration's own report was in no way meant to diminish the military's efforts. ___ David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at and
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Power of bunker-buster bombs Trump used on Iran revealed
The massive destructive power of the 30,000 pound bunker-buster bombs Donald Trump ordered to be dropped in Iran 's nuclear sites was put on full display in a newly released video. During a Pentagon press conference days after the strikes, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine reiterated that Operation Midnight Hammer was a success. The mission utilized over 125 planes and seven B-2 stealth bombers carrying a total of 14 bunker-buster bombs meant for Iran's mountainous Fordow uranium enrichment facilities. Trump said the site was 'obliterated' after the strike, but a leaked top secret intelligence assessment revealed that Fordow could be rebuilt in months - something the Pentagon and White House have furiously pushed back against. To prove the mission's effectiveness, Caine played a video showing exactly how the GBU-57 'bunker-buster' bombs work. In the video, a 20-foot-long and 30,000-pound GBU-57 can be seen slamming into the roof of a cave with wicked force. Another angle shows the cave entrance and the bomb passing into the chamber before detonating in a fiery explosion. U.S. B-2 stealth bombers dropped a total of 14 GBU-57s on Iran's Fordow nuclear enrichment facility, which is built deep under a mountain range. 'Unlike a normal surface bomb, you won't see an impact crater because they're designed to deeply bury and then function,' Caine explained. 'All six weapons at each vent at Fordow went exactly where they were intended to go,' he added. Though the video was a test of the GBU-57, and not footage from the actual operation, Caine said it proves how satellite imagery of the site cannot fully ascertain the damage caused within the subterranean nuclear site. The explosion was so vicious that one of the B-2 pilots said it made the night sky turn into 'daylight.' '[It was] the brightest explosion that I've ever seen,' Caine claimed the pilot said. 'It literally looked like daylight.' Dropped from the B-2s, the GBU-57s arrived on their targets traveling 1,000-feet per second, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs shared. Similar to the plot of 'Top Gun: Maverick,' the bombs were aimed at the buried nuclear site's ventilation shafts - the most vulnerable parts of the expansive facility. Since the site had two main ventilation shafts, six bombs were dropped on each. The video was 'a culmination of over 15 years of development and testing,' Caine said.
