MS NOW host Lawrence O’Donnell on Monday continued railing against President Donald Trump and his ongoing war on Iran, arguing the MAGA leader has once again “disgraced” himself by dishonoring the latest U.S. military service members who died in it.
The “Last Word” host came out swinging with a rather fiery accusation.
“Well, Donald Trump has never been able to convincingly express sympathy or sorrow for anyone other than himself,” said O’Donnell during a particularly scathing monologue. “That is the mark of a sociopath, of course, the inability to feel sorry for someone.”
He continued, “Many sociopaths are capable of saying, ‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ if someone in your family dies, but they are incapable of actually feeling sorry for your loss. They just know they’re supposed to say those words. Those well-rehearsed words.”
O’Donnell went on to argue that Trump is no longer capable of even feigning sympathy, however, by playing a clip from Sunday in which Trump was asked by a reporter aboard Air Force One if he had a comment on the six U.S. service members who died Thursday.
The fallen service members were aboard a military refueling aircraft that crashed in Iraq, and while they died in a war Trump started and claims is necessary, he dismissed the question Sunday by pointing at other reporters aboard and saying, “Go ahead, who else?”
“Nothing,” O’Donnell noted. “Not a word. Just an immediate turn away. ‘Who else?’”
He continued, “Who else has a question that’s not about the war dead. Six American Air Force personnel lose their lives in a refueling accident in Donald Trump’s war and Trump doesn’t have a word to say about them and their sacrifice and their family’s suffering.”
O’Donnell on Monday acknowledged the six service members who died last week by name: Air Force Sergeant Tyler Simmons, 28; Major John Klinner, 33; Captain Ariana Savino, 31; Sergeant Ashley Pruitt, 34; Captain Seth Koval, 38; and Captain Curtis Angst, 30.
While the six soldiers will receive their dignified transfer Wednesday in private without press or Trump in attendance, O’Donnell argued this won’t fully prevent the president from exploiting it — “as he did exploit the first dignified transfer that occurred during his war.”
The MAGA leader wore a baseball cap with “USA” written on it during the solemn occasion.
O’Donnell further flamed Trump for sending a recent fundraising email featuring a photo of him at the transfer wearing his hat, arguing any other president would be rebuked and condemned by unanimous House and Senate votes for such “dishonorable behavior.”
“Donald Trump disgraced himself as the only president in American history who has tried or would even consider trying to raise money over the bodies of the war dead in a war that he started,” O’Donnell said Monday.
The war has already cost at least 13 U.S. service members and more than 1,400 Iranians, including dozens of schoolgirls, their lives. Trump said Friday it will be over “when I feel it in my bones,” but let slip aboard Air Force One that “maybe we shouldn’t even be there at all.”
“And tonight the question remains, who else?” O’Donnell said Monday.
He continued, “Who else is going to die waiting for Donald Trump to feel it in his bones that it’s time to end his war? Who else is going to die and have their deaths ignored by the president who sent them into war — the president who feels nothing?”
