On Wednesday, former Donald Trump employee Anthony Scaramucci appeared on Stephanie Ruhle’s MSNBC show. to defend his former boss’ character. That’s not a surprise, but what is a surprise is way Scaramucci went about it.
In perhaps the most perfect example in recent memory of someone failing to understand even the basics of a piece of popular culture, Scaramucci — best known for working for Trump before getting fired after only 2 weeks — compared Trump to Logan Roy, the fictional media titan portrayed by Brian Cox in HBO’s “Succession.”
And to be clear, he thought this comparison was a compliment.
The oddball bit of TV analysis came just after Scaramucci described Trump as a “family guy” — which, OK — and things only got weirder from here.
“This is a family guy whether you like Mr. Trump or not. He’s sort of the Logan Roy of American Politics, you have this love/hate relationship with his Family,” Scaramucci said.
At this point a dumbfounded Ruhle interrupted to clarify some things about “Succession.”
“Oh come on a minute. Logan Roy is not a family man,” Ruhle said, correctly by the way. “Ward Cleaver is a family man.”
“No no,” a confused-looking Scaramucci said. “You’ve gotta watch the show very carefully, he actually loves those kids. It’s just this whole narcissistic web that he’s put those kids into.”
Shortly after, Scaramucci continued this, uh, novel description of Trump and his family in the context of how the impending trial might impact his presidential run in 2024.
“Mr. Trump ran the Trump organization with his children, he ran the reality show, with the children. Frankly, he ran the White House with the children. And they are noticeably absent here. Which makes me think he eventually withdraws from this race,” Scaramucci said shortly after. “I don’t think he makes it to the Iowa primary.”
“The way you describe the love of a child, and the way I describe the love of a child, are two very different things,” Ruhle said.
“It’s uh, we’ve got a lot of dysfunctional people out there, Stephanie, I’m just analyzing it for you. You know, he, you can like or dislike him but there’s something connecting him to those children no matter how dysfunctional it may be.” Scaramucci replied.
“Because they share his bloodline and, potentially, one could say he’s an ultimate narcissist,” Ruhle countered.
“They hang out with him all the time though, Steph,” Scaramucci said.
After a few seconds of Ruhle looking absolutely baffled, she brought the topic to a close and moved on.
You can watch the first part of this segment at the top of the page (via @Acyn on Twitter), and the continuation of it below:
Suffice to say, as seen on “Succession,” Logan Roy is many things — an adulterer, a man who abused and neglected his children while they were growing up, a powerful wealthy jerk whose actions do direct harm to the American political system, a greedy sociopath — but two things he definitely is not are 1) a “family guy” and 2) someone who loves, or is loved by, his kids.
Meanwhile, Trump faces 24 counts of felony business fraud stemming from his using campaign funds to buy the silence of a woman he cheated on his current wife with. He also did that whole Jan. 6 thing. And according to a 2022 documentary that included interviews with Trump’s children, he pitted them against each other growing up, and played favorites.
So yes, obviously it makes sense that Scaramucci would see “Succession” and be reminded of Trump. But, perhaps he could watch the show very carefully and understand why it’s not the defense he thinks it is.
