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Morning Joe: Trump ‘Dominated’ Debate, Made Case Against Clinton Machine the GOP Base Always Wanted

October 10, 2016

An embattled Donald Trump "dominated" the town hall debate the previous night, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough said Monday, and he made the case against the Clinton political machine that the Republican base has been "waiting for years now."

Capping off an extraordinary weekend where he hemorrhaged Republican endorsements in the wake of a bombshell tape recording him boasting about groping women in 2005, Trump went on the attack against Hillary Clinton, firing shots at her over her husband’s alleged sexual misconduct and her email scandal.

"It was Donald Trump’s most effective debate performance to date," Scarborough said on Morning Joe. "There’s not a close second ... Secondly, despite the fact she had an unprecedented cheering section in the media ... Hillary Clinton was on the defensive most of the night. She seemed unsure of herself most of the night, and he dominated the second debate in the same way she dominated the first debate."

Scarborough added that Trump "turned it up to 11" and made the Republicans who abandoned their endorsements of him on Friday potentially regret it.

"All of those people that jumped ship, about halfway through the debate, were looking at their TV saying, ‘Oh, shoot,’" he said.

Before the debate, Trump held a news conference alongside women who said the Clintons had victimized them, including Juanita Broaddrick, who has long alleged that Bill Clinton raped her in the 1970s.

Scarborough said the "political reality" was Trump made the case against the Clintons that Republicans always wanted.

"For the Republican base, Donald Trump delivered the attack against the Clinton machine that the Republican base in Middle America have been waiting for for years now," he said.

Co-host Mika Brzezinski added that no Republican could have pulled off the "epic" political theater that Trump did.

Both hosts, who were accused of being too cozy with Trump during the Republican primary before coming out vehemently against him over the summer, said Monday morning that people should not have been surprised to hear Trump’s sexually explicit remarks in the 2005 tape.