Republican Senator Ted Cruz has slammed MSNBC‘s Joe Scarborough, saying he had “victim-shamed” Donald Trump after the former president was the target of a second apparent assassination attempt.
Trump was unharmed after Sunday’s incident, when a Secret Service agent spotted a gun poking out of shrubbery at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, about 300 to 500 yards from where the former president was playing.
The episode marked the second attempt on the Republican presidential nominee’s life, coming just weeks after a July 13 shooting at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania where Trump’s ear was grazed by a gunman’s bullet.
Cruz took to social media on Thursday to say that Scarborough, an outspoken Trump critic, had “disgustingly victim-shamed” Trump on a recent episode of the Morning Joe podcast.
“I see why MSNBC pulled him off the air after the last assassination attempt,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter, referring to Morning Joe being taken off the air on the Monday morning after the July shooting.
Newsweek has contacted Cruz’s office for further comment via email and Scarborough via an email to MSNBC. The Trump campaign has also been contacted for comment via email.
Cruz’s post included a clip of his podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz, in which he also hit out at Scarborough.
It played audio from Tuesday’s edition of the Morning Joe podcast, where the show’s hosts discussed reporting on the long-standing concerns about the security challenges posed by Trump’s frequent rounds of golf.
They said that Secret Service agents had warned Trump soon after he became president about the risks of him golfing on his own course because of how close they were to public roads.
The agents noted that if photographers with long-range lenses could get Trump in their sights, potential assassins could too, The Washington Post reported, but the former president insisted that his clubs were safe.
Senator Ted Cruz on July 30, 2024, in Washington D.C. Cruz said MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough had “disgustingly victim-shamed” Trump after an apparent assassination attempt.
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
“I mean, let’s just victim-shame him,” Scarborough said, according to the clip posted by Cruz. “It’s his fault, folks. He deserves it.”
Cruz then responded to Scarborough’s comment by sarcastically saying Trump is the “only president so reckless and irresponsible as to go to a golf course.”
He continued: “That is ****** absurd. Let’s be clear: Gerald Ford went to the golf course repeatedly, Richard Nixon went to the golf course repeatedly, Jimmy Carter went to the golf course, Ronald Reagan went to the golf course, George Herbert Walker Bush went to the golf course, Bill Clinton went to the golf course, Barack Obama went to the golf course.
“Every president of our lifetimes and before has gone to the golf course. And yet, what does MSNBC say? It’s his fault. How dare he play golf? Because, understand, they’re operating in a world where they hate Trump so much that they view the only place he should be safe is in an underground bunker at NORAD in Colorado. Because if he’s out in public, their view is, well, look, he’s taking a risk. He’s going to be killed.”
Cruz went on to say that every other president managed to safely play golf.
“Why? Because the Secret Service was able to protect them. Here, there is not a sufficient detail to protect Donald Trump,” he said.
That, he claimed, is because President Joe Biden‘s administration is “so political, they do not want to assign the resources necessary to protect Trump.”
Authorities said the suspect, identified as 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh, camped outside the golf course with food and a rifle for nearly 12 hours, lying in wait for Trump before the agent spotted the gun and opened fire.
They said Routh did not fire any shots, never had Trump in his line of sight and sped away, leaving behind the loaded rifle with a scope and other items. He was arrested in a neighboring county and now faces charges of possessing a firearm despite a prior felony conviction and of possessing a firearm with an obliterated serial number, though additional charges are possible. No motive has been disclosed.
