Joy Reid was quick to correct conservatives during a panel discussion on “CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip” on June 24, providing a crash course in history — and her supporters are here for it.
“Damn she cooked them,” enthused one of her many admirers, who found the journalist’s candid, calm, and collected demeanor a breath of fresh air.
The former MSNBC host joined a group of heavy hitters on “NewsNight” to weigh in on Trump’s bombing of Iran at three nuclear sites (Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan) on June 22, which a majority of Americans, some 56%, disapprove of, according to CNN and CBS polls.
Sitting on the panel were Republican strategist Brad Todd, CNN political commentator Ana Navarro, former Clinton national security official Jamie Metzl, and criminal defense attorney Arthur Aidala, whose notable clients include Harvey Weinstein and Rudy Giuliani.
At times, the discussion devolved into a shouting match to see who could interrupt Reid the fastest, but she was unrelenting in her stance that Trump had no proof Iran possessed nuclear weapons, and that many MAGA supporters don’t know U.S. history.
A few days before the U.S. strike, the White House proclaimed that Iran could produce a nuclear bomb “within a couple of weeks,” but Reid didn’t buy it, saying we’ve been here many times before. Israel’s Prime Minister, “Netanyahu has been saying ‘two weeks away’ since 1996,” she interjected.
Reid broke it down for her fellow panelists: “Two nuclear powers, the United States and Israel, bombed a non-nuclear power, which under the Obama administration signed a deal to decrease their enrichment of uranium. … Donald Trump came along and abrogated and ended that agreement, such that they could begin enriching again,” she explained, referring to Obama’s 2015 JCOPA nuclear accord, abandoned by Trump in his first term.
Biden was unsuccessful in reviving the deal, and Iran has continued to enrich uranium, claiming their stockpile is used for energy production and other “peaceful purposes.”
Reid continued, “Did they during that time build a nuclear weapon?… The 16 intelligence agencies which assess this for a living, it is their only job, have already concluded that they were not attempting to.”
While that point is heatedly debated, no one wants to repeat the same grave mistakes of 2003, when the Bush Administration justified the Iraq invasion by erroneously claiming Saddam Hussein’s regime possessed weapons of mass destruction.
Reid also spelled out the events that led up to the 1979 Iran hostage crisis for Todd, who glossed over important details of the Iranian Revolution when he said “fundamentalist radicals took over the government.”
After giving Todd serious side-eye and an “I’m gonna squash this bug face,” she laid out the facts.
“They overthrew the Shah, who we imposed on Iran because of the Dulles brothers,” referring to former Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and former CIA Director Allen Dulles, who helped topple the democratically elected leader of Iran, Mohammad Mossadegh, in a conflict over oil. The U.S. and U.K.-led coup in 1953 reinstated the Shah, who destabilized Iran and signed over 40 percent of Iran’s oil fields to the U.S.
“And [Iran] said, you may not audit us. And then we overthrew [Mossadegh] and he wound up dying in prison because we decided, in our arrogance as a country, we’ve got to own their oil,” she told a flummoxed Todd.
“Miss you Joy!” cheered her supporters on X. “GOT. DAMN! That was brilliant. I don’t watch CNN because I can’t stand them, really, but if Abby Phillips keeps bringing Joy on, and if she bans that jack**s Scott Jennings, I might watch,” wrote BrooklyDadDefiant!
Reid continued to throw truth bombs right and left during the segment, using some choice words to criticize Aidala’s “lame” attack on Zohran Mamdani, the young democratic socialist who beat Andrew Cuomo in the New York City mayor’s primary on June 24. When Aidala mentioned Mamdani’s lack of experience, Reid went off — to the delight of her fans.
“Trump’s experience was being on The Apprentice. He’s got the head of the Pentagon, whose experience is being a weekend anchor on Fox. Are you kidding me? Dr. Oz is in his administration. After Donald Trump and his Pinky and the Brain administration, no one ever gets to talk qualifications again.”
“And now you see why Joy was pushed out of MSNBC. She does not told the Democratic party line talking points and that is why she was pushed out plus Trump doesn’t like her,” raved on a supporter.
“Joy’s facial expression when the MAGA bros were spreading disinformation had me on the floor laughing. Do they realize how ridiculous they sound, and thank you, Joy, for speaking truth to power.”
