Mike Barnicle

“There are 220,000 Americans who are dead today – dead – and it’s not because people are tired of the pandemic. People are tired of the incompetence that the pandemic has been met with and the incompetence stems from Donald Trump’s handling of the virus,” says Morning Joe contributor Mike Barnicle during this conversation with host Mika Brzezinski following President Trump’s continued public attacks on Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, and the media, amid the coronavirus outbreak that continues to ravage the country just two weeks from the presidential election.

Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and writer/MSNBC political analyst Anand Giridharadas discuss the media ecosystem, and in particular Fox News, and what voters regard as “true, salient facts.” Hear Giridharadas’ estimation that the majority of Trump voters are not living in reality but in a “castle of fantasy.” Watch the conversation here.

“The reality is—we all know what the reality is—Donald Trump can only see himself. He does not see the people in the audience. He does not understand their plight. He does not understand the reality that they could obviously get the virus and be in tremendous physical difficulty,” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during this Morning Joe conversation with Willie Geist about President Donald Trump’s false claims about a “cure” for coronavirus amid the huge gap in care available to the president and everyday Americans who are faced with growing numbers of infections, costly medical bills and rising unemployment. “There’s a huge difference between the two and Donald Trump just doesn’t get that difference.”

Watch this Morning Joe conversation between Joe Scarborough and Mike Barnicle about how the coronavirus pandemic is at the center of this upcoming presidential election between President Donald J. Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden, with record numbers of Americans infected and facing huge COVID health bills at a time when unemployment is on the rise. Americans “live in fear and anxiety of who is coming to help, and thus far, nobody has come to help,” says Barnicle about the Trump Administration’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak in the U.S.

ICYMI: Watch this Morning Joe conversation between Willie Geist and Mike Barnicle as they discuss President Donald Trump’s chances for re-election amid the coronavirus pandemic with less than three weeks to Election Day. “The facts are grim and grizzly: America is number one—ladies and gentlemen—we’re number one in the number of infections from the disease and we’re number one in the number of deaths from the disease thus far. The disease is not going away. The virus is not going away. It’s been handled terribly, incompetent by guess who? The man standing in front of those rallies, Donald J. Trump, and he can’t deal with it…I think he knows he’s losing and you have to be really, really out of it not to know that. So, this is what he’s left with: A pile of delusion, fantasy, and the hope that what he’s looking at out in Johnstown, Pennsylvania…that he can recreate 2016. It doesn’t look like he can,” says Barnicle about President Trump’s re-election chances.

Morning Joe contributor Mike Barnicle and Kurt Bardella, former House Oversight Committee spokesman, discuss the first presidential debate between President Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden. Bardella says: “We just saw the desperation of Donald Trump and someone who is trying to lay the groundwork to try to justify why he is probably going to be on the other side of one of the largest electoral lopsided losses in the history of our country.”

ICYMI: Tune in to this Morning Joe conversation between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward, author of the new book “Rage,” about whether President Donald J. Trump understands or cares about the needs of everyday Americans and what the next move will be by the Republican Party on the heels of Trump bullying and bulldozing his way through the first presidential debate against Democratic nominee Joe Biden on Fox News. Find out here.

Tune in to this Morning Joe conversation between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and The New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker to discuss Susan Glasser and Baker’s new book, “The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III,” a definitive biography of James A. Baker III, who served as Ronald Reagan’s treasury secretary and George H.W. Bush’s secretary of state. Hear their conversation about James Baker’s own presidential aspirations here.

“Seven hundred and fifty in taxes. Seventy thousand for your hair, Donald? To take care of your hair. These are elements that people talk about. The depth of it: You know he’s a crook. People sort of know that—a lot of people sort of know that. His career as a businessman, that might be revealing to people—that he’s a terrible businessman….It’s going to be a slow impact,” says Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle in a conversation with host Willie Geist about whether President Donald Trump’s reelection prospects will be hurt by the recently published bombshell story from The New York Times that chronicles years of Trump’s tax avoidance and financial difficulties, including that he had paid only $750 in federal income taxes the year he was elected president, and no federal income tax in 10 of the previous 15 years.

“In addition to the 200,000 deaths, there are millions, millions of people today—families today—fractured economically because the United States Congress, specifically the United States Senate, the Republicans in the United States Senate, will not bail them out when they’re drowning economically right in front of them,” says Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during this conversation with Willie Geist about the fallout from President Donald Trump’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic ravaging the U.S. “So, the country has indeed changed and whether it’s unalterably changed, we’re going to find out—but it sure is depressing.”

Tune in for this Morning Joe conversation with veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and actors Robin Wright and Cary Elwes as they discuss the enduring legacy and cultural relevance of the 1987 film “The Princess Bride” directed by Rob Reiner, adapted by William Goldman from his 1973 novel “The Princess Bride.”

“If you do a forensic autopsy of the failures of this Administration with regard to COVID-19, its handling of it….it is horrendous. And we are approaching 200,000 deaths from COVID-19 in this country,” says Morning Joe contributor and veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during a conversation about with Mika Brzezinski. “There’s going to be no wall with the names of the casualties, the victims, the killed in action victims to COVID-19….Yellow ribbons at the end of the driveway on your mailbox aren’t going to cut it. This is a complete breakdown and failure, incompetence and immorality—I would submit of this Administration—and people like Donald Trump’s enablers in person just now Bill Barr, the attorney general of the United States.” Watch the discussion here.

Morning Joe veteran columnist remembers 9/11 on this 19th anniversary of terrorist attacks with reflections on an event that memorialized two Bedford, Massachusetts, sons lost to war: John Hart, 20 years of age when he was killed in Iraq in 2003, and Travis Desiato, 19, when he was killed in Fallujah in 2004. “The two families – Brian Hart and the Desiatos – they stood there, and they weren’t angry, they weren’t yelling, they weren’t ideological. They had gathered some people and a few members of the press because they wanted people to know that their two boys who had options, other than joining the Army and the Marine Corps, had options—but chose to serve the United States of America. They sacrificed their lives. They weren’t ‘losers,’ they weren’t ‘suckers,’ that’s what this family wanted. And there was more sadness than there was anger and the sadness was over the fact that as Brian Hart – John Hart’s father – said, that we are now led by a man like Donald J. Trump,” says Barnicle as he shares with Willie Geist and viewers the story of a memorial service held for two young fallen American soldiers.

“We can measure the damage the virus has done. We do it with a body count, sadly, approaching 200,000 people, and multiple millions of cases. But we can’t really measure the damage that Donald Trump has done to institutions of this country and the damage he’s done to the country itself…to the people of this country by his behavior, his verbiage, his rhetoric, his daily rhetoric, his daily lies—as you point out—is almost incalculable,” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during this Morning Joe conversation with host Joe Scarborough about the findings in legendary journalist Bob Woodward’s latest book “Rage” which reveals that President Trump admitted he knew weeks before the first confirmed U.S. coronavirus death that the virus was dangerous, airborne, highly contagious and more deadly than even your strenuous flus.

Tune in to watch this Morning Joe conversation between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) about the economic struggle for millions of Americans amid the coronavirus outbreak and the need for more financial relief since the last federal assistance check that many families received was more than two months ago.

“There is the virus on the ballot this year, and the virus will be on the ballot this year…and it’s going to come down to the message: Where are we going in the future? That’s what people want to hear. They don’t want to be scared. They want to know: Where are we going?” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during this Morning Joe conversation with host Willie Geist about voter interest in the 2020 presidential election. Hear more of the discussion now about the race between Democratic nominee Joe Biden and President Donald Trump ahead of the first presidential debate.

Tune in for this Morning Joe conversation between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and president of the American Federation of Teachers Randi Weingarten about what is working and what’s not when it comes to K-12 education in the U.S. and the need for “better leadership nationally” amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Tune in for the Morning Joe discussion between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and Wall Street Journal reporter Justin Scheck, co-author of new book “Blood and Oil: Mohammed bin Salman’s Ruthless Quest for Global Power,” about the tension in the Middle East between Saudi Arabia’s Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Iran. “What is his goal, his ultimate goal, and the potential danger of that goal with regard to Saudi Arabia versus Iran?” asks Barnicle. Hear Scheck’s answer here.

“This is an attorney general who has corrupted the professional staff of the Justice Department. He is in the process of doing something that Donald Trump’s Administration has been doing in department, after department, after department—destroying it,” says Morning Joe contributor Mike Barnicle during this segment with host Joe Scarborough about Attorney General William Barr’s claim that he was unaware of state laws illegality of voting twice after President Donald Trump suggested that people should attempt to vote twice to test the electoral system’s integrity. Watch the segment here.

Tune in for this Morning Joe conversation between Joe Scarborough and Mike Barnicle as they remember Tom Seaver, a Hall of Fame baseball pitcher and the hero of New York’s Miracle Mets, who has passed away at 75 years old from complications of Lewy body dementia and COVID-19. “Tom Seaver was an artist. To watch him perform on the mound with the New York Mets, especially Mr. Met, was an incredible experience. He was a legitimate Hall of Famer before they even voted him into the Hall of Fame,” says Barnicle. Hear more here.