Mika Brzezinski on MSNBC's Shift.
Mika Brzezinski and her Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough have both been attacked by Donald Trump on Twitter this year, and in a new interview with POLITICO, Brzezinski revealed how being singled out by the president of the United States has multiplied the hate she gets and has taken the joy out of her job.
Trump lashed out against Brzezinski and Scarborough in June after apparently being told that the pair had talked about him negatively on their show. Though he gave them both insulting nicknames — “Low I.Q. Crazy Mika” and “Psycho Joe” — the comment that drew the most disgust was his insult on Brzezinski’s appearance.
“She was bleeding badly from a face-lift,” Trump wrote.
“I was on the set, I was finishing the show, and everybody looked really uncomfortable,” Brzezinski told POLITICO, recalling the day Trump blasted off the tweets. “Willie [Geist] showed it to me, he was sitting next to me. I felt like people were more upset than I was.”
Brzezinski explained that at the time of Trump’s tweets, she’d already been going through two years of personal tragedy and grief following the deaths of her father and best friend, a divorce, two heart attacks her mother suffered, and a scare she had when she thought her daughter had been kidnapped. The show host said the level of Trump’s tweet was “below zero” for her and, at the time, she felt numb in the face of the attack.
“The ones about the facelift were humorous,” she said. “I wasn’t on the same page as everyone else. I feel embarrassed if people think I was embarrassed. I got Botox. I’m very open about that stuff. It didn’t hurt me.”
But the hate she’s continued to receive has taken on toll and made working on Morning Joe a less enjoyable experience than what it once was.
“I’m getting more hate now than I’ve ever gotten in my life,” said Brzezinski. “I can’t read it. I’m working on unplugging more because it’s the worst I’ve ever seen it.”
She explained that the show “is a job I used to love, now it’s a job I have to do every day.”
“I make a point of taking days off, because I have to keep my thoughts in check,” she continued. “One shrill moment will be ripped on the internet. I don’t love it as much, but I feel really like, dammit, I’m going to work.”
Perhaps realizing how grim the quote sounded, Brzezinski published a tweet after the interview’s publication to assure her followers that she’s grateful to have her job.
“I love working at my job on Morning Joe,” she wrote. “But this moment we find ourselves in is deeply challenging and makes me more determined than ever to speak truth to power. I am very blessed.”
Brzezinski revealed that she plans on revealing details of the night at Mar-a-Lago Trump mentioned in his tweets attacking her and her co-host.
“I’m actually rewriting my book, ‘Knowing Your Value,’” she said. “I’m going to be telling some behind the scenes stories and that night.”
Update: Mika clarified on Twitter that she loves her job:
Image: MSNBC
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