MSNBC “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski implied on Thursday morning that President Donald Trump’s rhetoric was somehow ultimately responsible for the attempted assassination of Republican congressmen in Alexandria, Virginia, on Wednesday.

While halfheartedly acknowledging a myriad of other possible factors that may have contributed to the toxic political climate (save increasingly extreme mainstream liberal rhetoric), Brzezinski made it clear that she believes — and therefore wishes her audience to believe — that Trump’s arrival on the political scene was the spark that set America ablaze.

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“I think that very carefully we have to talk about the added dynamic here,” Brzezinski said. “We also have a president who pushes fake news and conspiracy theories — to birtherism, to promoting violence on the campaign trail, I mean this is the new dynamic here.”

“I’m not putting anything squarely on the president here, but this is a new added dynamic to a very dangerous climate,” she said.

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Co-host Joe Scarborough was more reasonable but also declined to acknowledge the ways in which Democrats and the left increasingly engage in rhetoric dehumanizing and vilifying Republicans.

“The heated record in this country has to calm down,” Scarborough said. “There has been a disconnect in American society, in American culture, and in American politics, that … is driven in part by social media, driven in part by cable news, driven in part by fake news on the internet, driven in part by hatemongers who actually make money and become fabulously wealthy creating conspiracy theories that paint the other side as evil.”