MSNBC host Joy Reid claimed Tuesday that Fox News hosts were intentionally spreading misinformation about COVID-19 and the available vaccines, and she argued that they were doing it because it was “fun for them.”
Reid, joined on her daily show “The Reidout” by New York Times editorial board member Mara Gay and presidential historian Michael Beschloss, said that Fox News personalities were willfully misleading their own viewers and fans for “clicks” and that they didn’t care how many of them might die because of that.
Another one for the “Republicans are using Covid to kill people for fun” column pic.twitter.com/CT3fd0MDsk
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) December 22, 2021
“You know, God bless Joe Biden for — you know, he’s not perfect,” Reid began, and Beschloss nodded emphatically as she continued, “You know, there are a lot of things we can complain about about President Biden, but he actually is a caring human being who does want the whole country to survive this.”
“And there are just people there who have decided to turn him into the devil,” Reid continued, appearing to refer to Fox News. “Just because they would rather hear Tucker and all those … clowns, in a vaccinated — probably the most vaccinated company in America is Fox News — they’re all vaccinated.”
“They’re going to live through this and let their viewers and their fans die,” Reid added as Gay and Beschloss continued to smile and nod along. “They don’t give a damn. It’s just clicks to them. It’s just — they don’t care what happens, it’s — this is fun for them. You know? God bless Biden.”
“And are hundreds of thousands of people supposed to die to undermine Joe Biden and help the Republicans?” Beschloss asked.
“It’s sad,” Reid agreed. “Yeah. It’s what they think. Let ’em die. If it gets them power again, they’ll let as many people die as are gonna die, they don’t care.”
President Joe Biden made a similar — if somewhat watered down — statement during his Tuesday address on the rise of the Omicron variant and the continued spread of COVID-19 in the United States.
As the Daily Wire reported:
[Biden] went on to note that people became more resistant to the vaccine as the summer approached, blaming their hesitance on cable news — although he did not name a specific network — and social media.
“Look, the unvaccinated are responsible for their own choices, but those choices have been fueled by dangerous misinformation on cable TV and social media. You know, these companies and personalities are making money by peddling lies and allowing this information that can kill their own customers and their own supporters. It’s wrong. It’s a immoral. I call on the purveyors of these lies and misinformation to stop it. Stop it now,” he said.
Biden notes that many Americans remain unvaccinated because of “dangerous misinformation” on cable TV and social media: “I call on the purveyors of these lies and misinformation to stop it, stop it now…” pic.twitter.com/UqawLeScSI
— Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) December 21, 2021
Biden had previously accused Facebook of “killing people” by not doing a more thorough job of policing what people were saying about the effectiveness and safety of the available COVID-19 vaccines more tightly