Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Republicans ‘high on their own supply’ of election lies, says MSNBC host

MSNBC host Ari Melber quoted the movie Scarface about Republican losses in Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky

Eric Garcia
Friday 10 November 2023 14:09 EST
Comments
Former President Donald Trump
Former President Donald Trump (AP)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

MSNBC host Ari Melber quoted the movie Scarface and said that Republicans had bought into too many of their own lies about the 2020 presidential election.

Melber spoke on Thursday evening about how Republicans faced massive electoral defeats in Ohio, Kentucky and Virginia and noted how the Republican Party is now in thrall to the wing that supports former president Donald Trump and his lies about the 2020 election.

“The fact that the Trump wing of the party embraced denialism has hurt the party's ability to get anywhere near competitive,” he said. “If you're watching this and want a healthy democracy, that's a bad thing. If you're watching and want Republicans to keep losing elections you're hoping they keep making this mistake.”

Melber then played a clip from the movie Scarface wherein Elvira Hancock, played by Michelle Pfeiffer, said “Lesson two, don’t get high on your own supply.”

The line comes after Democratic Gov Andy Beshear won re-election, Ohio voted to enshrine abortion rights in its constitution and Democrats flipped the Virginia House of Delegates, preventing an 15-week abortion ban that the Republican Gov Glenn Youngkin campaigned on.

“You could be dealing, you could be lying, you could be giving into others, but when you start dealing to yourself, when you and your own team are getting high, losing your sense of reality, losing your sobriety, politically and otherwise, well, you really played yourself,” he said.

“Trump pushed the party into spending years high on its own supply, demanding it, making it a kind of litmus test that future candidates running in related elections had to get high on his supply and pretend he didn't even lose the race he lost,” Melber said.

He then proceeded to play clips from Fox News with hosts fretting about Republicans losing on the issue of abortion.

“Those are folks standing up and saying ‘hey, this has been a narrative, a lie, a high claim about a bunch of stuff from Donald Trump’s losses to other policy issues with a bunch of people getting high together and telling themselves stories that aren’t true that are hurting themselves,’” he said.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in