Trump's 'idiotic moment" has turned him into an international 'laughing stock': MSNBC

MSNBC panelists focused on one particular moment during this week's presidential debate that made Donald Trump an international "laughing stock."

Kamala Harris seemingly triggered the Republican nominee by observing that many of his rallygoers leave early out of "exhaustion or boredom," which set the former president on a meandering rant that featured debunked claims that immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were stealing and eating pet cats and dogs — which mystified media outlets at home and abroad.

"Even allies now worry that his unsubstantiated claims about migrants eating people's pets has weakened his cause," said MSNBC anchor Chris Jansing. "It is part of a pattern. Trump brings up what he calls migrant crime or the migrant invasion in almost every single rally he does, but his decision to embrace this particular conspiracy theory has taken on a life of its own.

"Even Germany's foreign ministry, in a statement about renewable energy, included a [postscript]: 'We don't eat cats and dogs.' A headline in the British paper The Standard called him a 'laughing stock.' Harris' plan, meantime, seems to be to let Trump keep talking. The thinking being he's only hurting himself."

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A focus group convened by Fox News found that approval from all groups — Democrats, independents and Republicans — dipped during the debate when Trump claimed that migrants were eating pets, with the strongest dips among independents and Republicans.

"This was an idiotic moment by Donald Trump, truly an idiotic moment, and as the focus groups show, Democrats, independents, Republicans all are scratching their heads, saying, why is Donald Trump doing this?" former GOP congressman David Jolly said on MSNBC.

"I think part of what is so unsettling is we also see a former president trying to regain the White House by paying attention to internet conspiracies and social media conspiracies and the likes of Laura Loomer and others going into this debate, so we see someone lacking the capacity to return to the White House if he didn't have it in the first place."

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