Don’t mess with Texas … voters who care about the First Amendment — or “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”

On Wednesday’s episode of MS NOW’s “Morning Joe,” host Joe Scarborough argued that one of the main reasons why state Rep. James Talarico defeated Rep. Jasmine Crockett in Texas’ Democratic primary for Senate was because he gained a whole lot of visibility after his “Late Show” controversy.

Last month, Talarico and Colbert said the Federal Communications Commission “colluded” with CBS executives to keep an interview he did on the “Late Show” off the air.

This is not the first time Colbert has clashed with his network’s overlords and the President Donald Trump-appointed FCC Chair Brendan Carr. Last year, CBS announced that it would cancel “The Late Show” in May 2026 after Colbert ripped CBS’s parent company, Paramount Global, for settling a lawsuit with the president — a move critics felt threatened freedom of speech.

“I swear, I just wish these Republicans weren’t so stupid. I wish they’d listen to me. I’m trying to help them out a little bit here, just to make it a fair fight in the fall,” Scarborough said Wednesday of Talarico winning Texas’ Democratic Senate primary. “But what did we say? What did we say? First of all, when they took Colbert off the air? You’re going to pay for it. They did pay for it with ‘South Park’ three or four days later, deciding they’re going to lean in even harder. Right?”

Scarborough continued: “And so here they try to keep Talarico off the show. What happens? They give him a boost. If you talk to Jasmine Crockett, she’ll say the same thing — ‘I was ahead until that controversy.’ So the very person they were trying to defeat, the very person whose message scared them, is the very person who they helped win this race!”

Scarborough concluded his thoughts on the Senate primary by saying that Republicans need to chill out with their attempts to “game the system” by pulling shady stunts.

“It just keeps happening over and over. They think they can game the system. They think that somehow, they’re going to be able to win. In the end, voters have the final say,” Scarborough said.

CBS denied Talarico and Colbert’s accusation about the spiked interview, saying that the show was given legal guidance that broadcasting Talarico’s interview could “trigger the FCC equal-time rule,” which means that Colbert might also have to interview the other candidates involved in Texas’ Senate primary race if he aired the one with Talarico.

Crockett, whose profile has significantly risen thanks to some very meme-able moments in Congress, may have seen the writing on the wall about her Senate primary ambitions after Talarico gained a whole lot of public interest after his Colbert interview was pulled. After her opponent accused the FCC and CBS of tomfoolery, Crockett made a point to tell the press the same thing that CBS said about the situation.

Crockett said she received information suggesting that CBS didn’t air the interview “because of a fear the FCC may say something to them, and that there may have been advice to just have me on, and then they can clear the issue. It is my understanding someone, somewhere, decided we just don’t want to do that.”

She added that although she does not “have love for the current FCC” she did think “there are additional layers at play here.”

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