Joe Versus the Volcano

When he’s not hosting four hours of daily television, Joe Scarborough is pondering how Donald Trump did it again, and what that says about American politics—and America itself. In the wake of Trump’s second inauguration, the former G.O.P. congressman talked about 45/47’s dark vision, the brewing battle between the MAGA base and the tech billionaires, and the blowback over his and Mika’s trek to Mar-a-Lago.

“The Democratic Party has a unique opportunity here. If they get a lot of the other issues right—or, at least, if they can respond to the Republican attacks on these social issues in a more effective, more aggressive, less apologetic way—then they can talk about the ineptness of Washington leaders and elites,” Joe Scarborough tells Puck's John Heilemann. Photo: John Lamparski/Getty Images

John Heilemann

January 22, 2025

Inaugurations are, by definition, historic. But I can’t think of one more eventful, newsy, or just plain weird than Donald Trump’s sequel to the “American carnage” goat rodeo of 2017. Look no further than the fact that 45/47 delivered, in effect, two separate inaugural addresses: the scripted (and decidedly low-energy) official rendition in the Capitol Rotunda, followed by the grievance-laden, backward-looking screed he uncorked a few minutes later to supporters in the Capitol Visitor Center. The second, free-form version felt more familiar and far more authentic, festooned as it was with conspiracy theories and alternative facts that, in the president’s own telling, J.D. Vance and Melania had talked him out of including.