MIKA BRZEZINSKI (CO-HOST): [Donald] Trump, meanwhile, was quick to attack [Hillary] Clinton during a rally in Sacramento last night.

[BEGIN VIDEO]

DONALD TRUMP: Hillary is not a talented person. In fact, she’s a person with absolutely no natural talent. All you have to do is watch her speak. And you ever notice, even for a minor speech, she has teleprompters. Do I have teleprompters here? No. But she’s got like these minor speeches and she’s going -- and I saw this a couple of times, four words: we’re going to win in the north, south, east, and west, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba. Oh, boy. So insincere.

[BREAK]

TRUMP: Hillary Clinton, and this is 100 percent, Hillary Clinton who lies -- I mean she lies, you remember that? I started that. She lies. She lies. She made a speech, and she's making another one tomorrow. And they sent me a copy of the speech, and it was such lies about my foreign policy that they said I want Japan to nuke, I want Japan to get nuclear weapons. Give me a break.

[END VIDEO]

BRZEZINSKI: I mean if anything, Joe, he's still talking to the base. And as Donny [Deutsch] just pointed out, comparatively those two sound bites -- from Hillary Clinton attacking him elegantly and strongly, I thought effectively, to Donald Trump in the hat, he looked almost unhinged. I mean like he needed a prompter really badly.

JOE SCARBOROUGH (CO-HOST): Again, again, there are -- Katty Kay, for some time we've heard reports in the press that the family has been trying to get Donald Trump to look more presidential. Paul Manafort has been trying to get Donald Trump to look more presidential. They obviously are losing that battle. I mean here we are in the general election for the most part, we might as well be, and he's talking about her speaking ability and just says she lies, lies, lies, lies. Like he's running against Ted Cruz here. He's regressing as a political candidate, and it's one of the more baffling things I've ever seen.

KATTY KAY: It's almost, there's a sense of despair about the way he reaches for superlatives. It's not just that she has no talent. She has absolutely no talent. She is a liar. As if he can almost will himself to make this the truth. And if you contrast that to what Hillary Clinton was saying yesterday, I was at that rally in Rutgers, and she seemed to just, she seemed to -- I have to say Joe -- to be very happy up there on the stage. She seemed to enjoy this new line of attack on him. She came straight out and went straight after him on Trump University. It was the first thing she said, but she had specifics. She was going after Trump U. That was fraudulent. She wasn't saying he is, blanket, a fraud. And there is a difference in tone about it. You listen to Donald Trump in that clip, and it sounds slightly desperate.

SCARBOROUGH: Yeah, no, Willie, we've known Donald for a long time. We've known him personally for a long time. He's been a friend. And people have been asking me over the past couple weeks what's going on with him. I haven't a clue. But do you have any working theories here about why he seems to be moving the exact opposite direction of where he needs to go to win general election voters?

WILLIE GEIST (CO-HOST): To me, it's pretty simple, and it's the lesson he learned through the primary is that being Donald Trump and all that entails is what got him this far and why should he stop now. And that means winging it up on stage, that means insulting his opponents, that means playing fast and loose with the facts. He's being Donald Trump. He saw how well it worked. He started last June about a year ago, wasn't sure what was going to happen. It carried him through the summer, the fall, and through all those primaries. Why should Donald Trump change now? I think that's the philosophy that he's working under. And the truth is, he's going to be held to account for a lot of these things he said. Hillary Clinton has a professional campaign that's been looking into these things. She's going to make a speech today about him proposing Japan getting nuclear weapons. He said yesterday he never said that. He did say that. He said that Japan should have nukes and should start taking care of itself against North Korea and that we should be sick and tired of defending countries like that. The facts, the things he's said over the last year will come back now to haunt him.

Previously:

An Extensive Guide To The Fact Checks, Debunks, And Criticisms Of Trump’s Various Problematic Policy Proposals

Veteran Campaign Reporters: “The Stakes Are Too High” To Let Trump Get Away With Constant Lying

Veteran Journalists: Trump Coverage “Devastating” For News Credibility