'Did anyone tell him that was dumb?' MSNBC's Mika asks ex-Trump aide about 'bleeding from the face' tweet

MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski pressed a former White House aide for details about the reaction among staffers to President Donald Trump's tweet insulting her physical appearance.

Cliff Sims appeared Tuesday on "Morning Joe" to promote his new book, Team of Vipers, detailing chaos inside the White House, and host Joe Scarborough asked the former aide to describe the day Trump targeted him and Brzezinski with personal insults.

"He gets off (the private elevator) the morning he sent that tweet, and Sean Spicer and I are standing there and the president comes off and says, 'Have you seen it?'" Sims said. "The 'bleeding from the face' tweet. I said, 'I think everyone's seen it.' He said, 'What do you think?' and poor Sean Spicer says, 'I think it was very aggressive.'"

Scarborough said the president watches their show every day, according to those close to him, and Brzezinski challenged Sims to explain the reaction.

"Did anyone tell him that was a really dumb thing to do?" she said.

Sims insisted that aides pushed back against the president.

"I think people will be surprised that he's actually open to people saying, 'Hey, maybe we should have done that different, or what if we do X, Y, Z?' He's going to do what he's going to do, but he will take the feedback."

Political analyst Mike Barnicle called for Sims to hold up, and he asked him to explain the absurdity of the situation he had described inside the White House.

"Can we stop this train right here, and let's consider what you just said," Barnicle said. "He's the president of the United States, he's beginning his work day, he comes down on the elevator from the residence, the press secretary and you are there to greet him, the beginning of the president's work day and he says, 'Have you seen it,' talking about a tweet?"