Jen Psaki Snaps At Democrat Guest In Heated Back-And-Forth: ‘What The Hell Are You Doing?’

MSNBC host Jen Psaki rushed to defend President Joe Biden after a Democratic strategist joining her for a panel accused party leaders of insinuating he isn’t fit to hold office.

Appearing on Chris Hayes’s program Thursday evening, the former White House press secretary jumped in after Columbia University professor and contributor Basil Smikle blamed Democrats for undercutting Biden’s leadership with calls to drop out.

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“My issue is this: If you’re standing up, if you’re a Democrat right now and you’re standing up and you’re saying Joe Biden is not fit to run for office and therefore should not be in office in January, you’re also saying he’s not fit to be president right now. What the hell are you doing?” Smikle exclaimed as Psaki attempted to interrupt him. “That is what you’re saying,” he told her, “because you’re saying he does not have the chops to be president for the next four years starting in January, and I have a huge problem with that.”

Psaki repackaged Democrats’ fears differently, stating that many in the party feel Biden simply can’t beat former President Donald Trump a second time and don’t agree with Republicans that he should immediately step down.

“I actually think a lot of the Democrats who’ve been out there and a lot of the people who’ve been voicing concern are about whether he can defeat Donald Trump. They’re looking at the states, they’re looking at their districts, they’re looking at concerns about voters and whether he is up to the job. I have not heard a Democrat say, aside from maybe one in Washington State, that he should step down or he is not up to the job now. We’re having this conversation because Donald Trump in part is not Mitt Romney, right? Donald Trump is an existential threat to our democracy. So it’s a question, and a debate, and it’s important to have, and that’s how I feel. But I think a lot of people who are bringing forward questions are being very, very thoughtful about it. It does need to be resolved, and I agree with you on that, but it’s a question about how to be resolved,” she said.

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Hayes broke up the verbal scuffle to say that voters are being asked to judge President Biden’s ability four years from now “when he’s 85,” and the president should also consider if he “can be the same person four years from now that I am today.”

Frequently, Democrats harken back to the Republican Party of yesterday, referring glowingly to Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign as an example of high-minded statesmanship lost following the Trump era. Ironically, a look back at Psaki’s record as a spokeswoman for the Obama campaign shows that she regarded Romney not so differently from Trump today.

In September of 2012, the former Massachusetts governor was secretly recorded suggesting that 47% of the country would automatically rule out voting for him because they receive some kind of social welfare benefit. They “are dependent upon government” and “believe that they are victims,” Romney told donors at a private retreat, remarks seized on by Psaki as an example of the Republican’s cruel view of Americans.

“Mitt Romney wrote off nearly 50 percent of the country before he was even sworn into office. This is something that is shocking and really alarming to people,” Psaki said on CNN days later. “What the governor said is very significant, because it reveals something about his value system.”

President Biden on Thursday stood for his first press conference of the year as the White House Press Corps peppered him with questions about his summit with NATO leaders and his ability to serve another four-year term. Hours earlier, the 81-year-old incumbent badly stumbled at the podium, introducing Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky as “President Putin” and saying that he is proud to serve with “Vice President Trump.”

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