MS NOW’s Morning Joe crew mocked the White House claim that President Donald Trump was merely “blinking” during an Oval Office event on Monday to rebuke speculation that the president had dozed off.

The explanation came as the White House Rapid Response social media account snapped at Reuters national security correspondent Idrees Ali for posting a photograph of Trump with his eyes closed during the presser on maternal health.

Although Ali did not explicitly claim Trump had fallen asleep, the White House appeared to interpret the post that way, replying: “He was blinking, you absolute moron.”

Opening Tuesday’s show, Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski noted that “Trump appeared to be resting his eyes multiple times.”

Rounding on the tweet from the White House communications team, host Joe Scarborough said: “That’s a very long blink!”

“That’s the longest blink I’ve ever seen,” co-host Jonathan Lemire joined in.

As the clip rolled back, Scarborough laughed teasingly and commented, “Still blinking!”

“Not a lot of rights and access to health care to talk about, so maybe he fell asleep?” Brzezinski added.

Scarborough continued: “You know, the thing is, everybody’s entitled to sleep. And, you know, I like sleeping, you know, and sometimes you close your eyes, you’re in, you know, you get tired, but you remember Sleepy Joe?”

Both co-hosts said they did.

“Remember Joe Biden goes to a memorial service in Hawaii, and he closes his eyes for about three seconds, and a lot of people thought it was because he was sad at the tragedy there, and Trump’s people just went absolutely crazy?” he continued. “‘Sleepy Joe, Sleepy Joe.’”

Speaking of Trump, he said: “This isn’t the first time he’s appeared to be taking a catnap in the Oval Office. So again, you know [Ronald] Reagan did it. People do it. OK, that’s fine, but you can’t just go on and on and on about Sleepy Joe, Sleepy Joe, Sleepy Joe, and then sleep even more in the White House than your predecessor did.”

Lemire followed: “Yeah, they lost their minds at that moment back when Joe Biden was president. And what we’re seeing here is, with increased frequency, President Trump seems to be blinking at great length on-camera in the Oval Office in front of a lot of people, which is raising questions about him and his age as such.”

Producers then ran back a clip from Trump’s October 2024 appearance on the Fragrant podcast, making host Andrew Schulz laugh by mocking Biden as someone who sleeps a lot.

“You’ll never see me sleeping in front of cameras,” Trump quipped about the video.

“Well, Andrew Schultz chortling there,” Scarborough concluded. “He’s now seen the errors in his ways.”

Watch above via MS NOW.

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