President Donald Trump celebrated ‘Today’ show host Matt Lauer’s firing from NBC by going after executives and stoking a feud with MSNBC host Joe Scarborough – even dredging up a conspiracy theory about the death of a former Scarborough staffer.
Trump tweeted twice Wednesday about Lauer’s firing for alleged sexual misconduct – and immediately went after Scarborough, the former Florida congressman who has gone after Trump and changed his party registration.
‘So now that Matt Lauer is gone when will the Fake News practitioners at NBC be terminating the contract of [president] Phil Griffin? And will they terminate low ratings Joe Scarborough based on the “unsolved mystery” that took place in Florida years ago? Investigate!’ Trump wrote.
The president’s mention of the ‘unsolved mystery’ was presumably an effort to dredge up a conspiracy theory from 2001 about a 28-year-old staffer who was found dead in one of Scarborough’s district offices when he was a Florida congressman.
President Donald Trump went after executives and stoked a feud with MSNBC host Joe Scarborough after ‘Today’ show Matt Lauer’s firing
The president brought up an ‘unsolved mystery,’ a reference to the death of a Scarborough staffer in 2001
The staffer, Lori Klausutis, died after a having a heart arrhythmia and hitting her head on her desk, according to a medical examiner’s report.
Nevertheless, the story drew online conspiracy theories that Klausutis had been killed in some kind of a cover up.
Scarborough himself has reacted angrily when the conspiracy theory has popped up on several occasions, blasting the ‘libelous charge’ when a Vanity Fair journalist brought it up.
Trump raised the issue of what he called an ‘unsolved mystery’ in Florida – an apparent reference to a former Scarborough staff member who died in 2001
Scarborough wrote: (1) Lori worked in my annex office in Okaloosa County, Florida. (2) I met her no more than three times; I was never alone with her. (3) I didn’t leave Congress because of her death; I announced my retirement from Congress in May 2001-she passed away several months later.’
Left-wing blogger Markos Moulitsas was banned from MSNBC after he brought up the conspiracy theory online.
Scarborough went after him online, writing: ‘@markos Unbelievable. You have a long history of spreading lies suggesting I am a murderer. This is the 3rd or 4th time by my count,’ Gawker reported.
Scarborough had announced his decision to retire from Congress after three terms that year. He then went on to become an on-air host of ‘Morning Joe,’ where he interviewed Trump multiple times, visited Mar-a-Lago, and then had a highly public feud where Trump attacked Scarborough and his co-host turned fiancee Mika Brzezinski.
Trump also tried to throw mud at Andrew Lack, the chairman of NBC and MSNBC.
‘Wow, Matt Lauer was just fired from NBC for “inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace.” But when will the top executives at NBC & Comcast be fired for putting out so much Fake News. Check out Andy Lack’s past!’ Trump wrote, without providing further explanation.