MSNBC's Joe Scarborough on gun control: Ending slavery was slow progress, too
MSNBC "Morning Joe" host Joe Scarborough praised a bipartisan agreement on gun control, arguing the Senate was taking a step towards progress on gun laws much like it was slow progress to end slavery.
MSNBC host Joe Scarborough praised the bipartisan gun control plan made in the Senate on Sunday, comparing the actions to Abraham Lincoln ending slavery.
Opening Monday’s "Morning Joe," co-host Mika Brzezinski quoted President Biden calling the agreement a "step in the right direction." Scarborough lauded the move as incremental "progress" similar to Lincoln’s steps to abolish slavery.
"And it is progress. Slow progress but progress. I'm sure you know, I'm sure you've studied. Abraham Lincoln was often criticized for moving too slowly toward ending slavery. Abolitionists like Frederick Douglass noted the view from the abolition ground, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull, and indifferent. But Lincoln was an incrementalist because his enemies were absolutists in their support of slavery," the MSNBC host explained.
MSNBC host Joe Scarborough compared a bipartisan agreement on gun control to Abraham Lincoln ending slavery, on "Morning Joe," June 13, 2022.
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Scarborough urged liberal viewers to stay patient because this proposed agreement was a step towards "wildly popular" gun control measures like "universal background checks, raising the age of buying assault weapons from 18 to 21 and enacting red flag laws in all 50 states" that "could slow down and eventually stop mass killings in schools."
Even though the agreement didn't go as far as Democrats wanted, "progress was made," the host stated.
Scarborough then went back to equating legislating away gun rights to abolishing slavery.
A banner hangs at a memorial outside Robb Elementary School on Friday, June 3. (AP/Eric Gay)
"Lincoln once said of his often criticized march towards emancipation, and it being too slow, ‘I am a slow walker, but I never walk back’. May we all keep walking forward together toward a day when our children can again go to school without the fear of weapons of war and mass shootings," he implored.
Ten Republicans and 10 Democrats struck a deal in the Senate on Sunday to enact a "commonsense" gun control package. The framework agreed upon included increased funding for red flag laws, mental health and school safety measures and enhanced background checks for gun buyers under 21 years old.
Since the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24, Democrats and liberal media outlets have aggressively pushed for stricter gun control, including banning guns and repealing the Second Amendment.
Comedian Jimmy Kimmel asked President Biden on Wednesday if he would pass an executive order on gun control, following the Uvalde, Texas, shooting. (Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images) (Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images)
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But Republican Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas said on Fox News on Saturday that it was "very hard to legislate away" less common violent events like mass shootings.
"It's very hard to legislate away these anomalies. These mass dramatic shootings, which are very different from your regular gun violence, which is usually committed by a very specific subset in inner cities, and gangs, and drug cartels and drug gangs. But this mass shooting thing is really, really difficult," he told host Brian Kilmeade.