"Morning Joe" co-host Jonathan Lemire wondered whether President Donald Trump gave his closing message at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool because he's trying to lose.
On an Election Day panel with co-hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, Lemire quipped that Trump may have a financial interest in a huge election loss for Republicans.
Scarborough began the segment reading aloud a key piece of Trump's closing argument to Americans on Monday afternoon.
"The pipes have been removed. The pipes have been fitted. Pipes are very important to drainage," Trump said.
Scarborough conceded that indeed, pipes are important. He joked, "If you look into your cross tabs," which is the term used for political polling details.
"He's not wrong! And that's the thing. That's a problem with the libs on TV," Scarborough joked. "He's not wrong. Pipes are important. Pipes are important."
"I love pipes," conceded Lemire. But he had another question.
"I want to know if, perhaps, we should look to see if there's a suspicious Polymarket bet today on Democrats winning. Maybe that came from President Trump because of this closing argument, as one Republican told me yesterday. At least it wasn't about John Husted."
Over the past two years, large and suspicious transactions on prediction markets have left conspiracy theorists wondering whether someone in Trump's family placed bets based on insider knowledge.
Former Republican political strategist Mark McKinnon, the producer of the Showtime show "The Circus," said that if he were to cut an ad for Democrats, he would say that there should be an AI video of Trump rambling incoherently about pipes at the Reflecting Pool.
"And Republicans will say this. My sourcing is from Republicans, because Democrats are like, what? We could win this big?" said Scarborough. "The Republicans just are beyond themselves. It's not just been this week, it's not just been this month. It's not just been the past three months. What's he been doing? Everything he has done has been to hurt Republicans. He's on the wrong side of every 90/10 issue."
He cited the war, artificial intelligence, tariffs and slashing healthcare benefits, said the host's namesake.
"This proves that there's nobody in the White House — not that we needed proof — that can stand up to Donald Trump, because no one other than Donald Trump thinks it was a good idea to talk about the Reflecting Pool," McKinnon said. "And by the way, on the AI stuff and the data centers, Joe, this is so contrary to his fundamental message of Making America Great Again."
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