Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski said Friday that Donald Trump is acting mentally unstable on the campaign trail due to lack of sleep, saying "he's losing it."
Trump's erratic behavior in recent weeks, including publicly feuding with a Gold Star family, joking that "Second Amendment people" could possibly stop Hillary Clinton, and saying President Obama is the "founder of ISIS," has accompanied a sharp drop in the polls.
"I think he's absolutely exhausted," Brzezinski said. "I don't think he's slept since he won the nomination, and even before, when he was starting to realize that he was going to win the nomination."
She said she'd heard Trump sleeps in "two-hour spurts."
"That takes a toll on the brain in a very real way," she said. "It impacts your judgment. It impacts your mood. It impacts your ability to connect with people. It impacts your ability to retain and take in and process information. I think he's losing it."
Washington Post reporter Robert Costa relayed that he'd told Trump a year ago that he's "at his worst" when he's tired.
"He really balked at that suggestion," Costa said. "He said, 'I'm so high-energy.' I think this is how he sees himself, always high-energy, always on, even if he is tired."
Scarborough said Trump insiders agreed he was most likely to make mistakes when he was exhausted.
Brzezinski and Scarborough were criticized for being too cozy with Trump during his successful GOP primary run, but they have been among his most fervent media critics since he clinched the nomination.