MSNBC’s Joy Reid went into meltdown mode on Tuesday night as Republicans scored upset victories in statewide elections in Virginia, at one point claiming that parents being concerned about “education” was really just “code for ‘white parents don’t like the idea of teaching about race.’”
Reid made the remarks as Republican Glenn Youngkin won the state’s governorship, Winsome Sears won the state’s lieutenant governorship, and the GOP won the state’s attorney general’s office.
“The exit polls showed that, which was interesting, that the Coronavirus or that the virus was a very low importance to many voters,” Reid said. “It was ‘education,’ which is code for ‘white parents don’t like the idea of teaching about race.’ And I mean, unfortunately, race is just the most palpable tool in the toolkit, it used to be of the Democratic Party back in the day when they were Dixiecrats and now of the Republican Party.”
Joy Reid just now:
"Exit polls showed that the coronavirus was not important to voters in Virginia. It was education. Which is code for white parents don’t like the idea of teaching about race."
It's like she's trying to campaign for the GOP midterms already. pic.twitter.com/GU1qRnrQ62
— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) November 3, 2021
During another portion of MSNBC’s election coverage, Reid said that Republicans were dangerous and a threat to U.S. national security.
“I think we’ve all said a version of it, you have to be willing to vocalize that these Republicans are dangerous, that this isn’t a party that’s just another political party that disagrees with us on tax policy, that at this point, they’re dangerous,” she claimed. “They’re dangerous to our national security, because stoking that kind of soft white nationalism eventually leads to the hardcore stuff. It leads to the January 6 stuff because if people are tolerant of it in your party, they’re tolerant of the soft racism, it’s a really short trip to get to the January 6 insurrectionists.”
MSNBC's Joy Reid, with dangerous rhetoric that'll get Republicans hurt: "Republicans are dangerous…[T]his isn't a party that's just another political party that disagrees with us on tax policy. That at this point, they're dangerous. They're dangerous to our national security." pic.twitter.com/5NiWIbn1Qk
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) November 2, 2021
Reid trivialized the claim that critical race theory was being taught in schools, downplaying the issue by claiming that the term is used to describe “anything that makes a white parent uncomfortable.”
“It takes the exhausted, you know, voter who wants to vote on what is fundamentally a racist idea, right?” she said. “That you cannot teach the truth about Thomas Jefferson, you must give encomium to Thomas Jefferson in school, otherwise, that’s critical race theory. If you even talk about enslavement, that’s critical race theory, anything that makes a white parent uncomfortable is critical race theory.”
“And you’re absolutely right. He’s been very subtle and very slick, that Toni Morrison ad was too much of a blunt hammer,” she continued. “But everything he did up to, then I totally agree with you, he’s found a way to launder a pretty racist trope, this idea that we cannot talk about America’s history because it hurts my feelings. He’s turned that into a campaign. And I think what Democrats have to worry about is if he succeeds, and he wins, that is going to be the campaign model for every single Republican that’s running in 2022.”
Joy Reid: @GlennYoungkin has run a campaign on the "racist idea…that you cannot teach the truth about Thomas Jefferson" or "enslavement" b/c "that makes a white parent uncomfortable" and is thus deemed "critical race theory" even though "it's not even real" #VAgov pic.twitter.com/ssmVb2sciX
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) November 2, 2021
Reid suggested that removing controversial books from schools could result in books about Dr. Martin Luther King being removed from schools.
“What’s next? The biography of Dr. King? Is W.E.B. Du Bois next?” she said. “I mean, Dr. King said America might go to hell, are we gonna erase any of his, you know, his more sort of robust commentary on America? Is that not gonna be allowed to be taught? Trust and believe, he took that so far, that he probably animated some African American voters too.”
Joy Reid peddles the @GlennYoungkin/Toni Morrison lie, predicting that Terry McAuliffe could win #VAgov because Youngkin decided to run a racist campaign against Toni Morrison's Beloved and therefore run a campaign against all Black people pic.twitter.com/NyFSX2DIXH
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) November 2, 2021