'If you're explaining, you're losing': MSNBC panel rips Trump’s rally — and crowd size

On Tuesday, April 29, President Donald Trump marked his first 100 days back in the White House hold holding a MAGA rally in Michigan — a key swing state that he narrowly won in 2024 after losing it to former President Joe Biden in 2020.

Trump and his MAGA allies often exaggerate the size of his victory in Michigan, and according to an MSNBC panel, the Michigan rally wasn't nearly as large as MAGA Republicans are claiming it was.

Talking to Democratic political adviser Jennifer M. Palmieri — who attended the rally — during a Wednesday morning broadcast, MSNBC's Jonathan Lemire noted, "There aren't too many sort of old political cliches that apply to Donald Trump because he has broken so many molds and norms. But this one, I think, does. If you're explaining, you're losing. And he, last night, had to explain and defend and spin these tariffs because he knows there's already been some impact."

Lemire added, "But if they really go into place, if they ratchet up — the people in front of them, they're the ones that are going to be shouldering the cost."

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Lemire got no argument from Palmieri, who pointed out that Michigan residents are starting to feel the results of Trump's tariffs.

Palmieri told Lemire, "One of the most telling things I saw in Michigan was an ad for a local furniture store yesterday that was advertising tariff-busting prices.… And there was there was a UAW worker there last night that spoke that's a big supporter of President Trump and spoke in favor of it and said: We have to like, hang in there because this is worth it in the long term. But, you know, 900 — I believe 900 — auto workers have already lost their jobs here…. So the tariff section was not the section of the speech that got a good applause last night."

Palmieri noted Trump's obsession with "crowd size" at his events, telling Lemire, "This was the far and away the smallest rally I've ever been to of Trump. That doesn't mean there's still not a lot of support for him, but there was definitely a dutiful element to the to the rally, both in his delivery and the crowd's responses. They wanted to hear about immigration. That's what got them excited."

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