A major feud has broken out between MSNBC's Joe Scarborough and Fox News's Sean Hannity.  Last night, it got very, very personal.

The two cable news hosts have been sniping at each other for months:

In February, the Fox News anchor went off on the MSNBC personality after Scarborough accused Stephen Miller, an advisor to President Trump, of "embarrassing" the White House with appearances on Sunday talk shows.

Joe why don't you focus on getting your horrific ratings up. They totally suck. And I'll take Steve Miller on my team over u any day. https://t.co/9FKBvpYRXp

— Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) February 13, 2017

 

Hannity is a Republican loyalist, while Scarborough, a GOP congressman for six years, lives in the MSNBC universe and is a Beltway favorite.  While the ratings for his three-hour-long Morning Joe show, from 6 to 9 A.M. Eastern, are low, the bipartisan political establishment considers it the most important morning show and watches and appears on it.  Since the election of President Trump, Scarborough has been generally very negative about him – so much so that Trump stopped following Scarborough's Twitter feed in March.  During the campaign for the GOP nomination, Scarborough had been generally fair to candidate Trump, making him stand out among MSM figures.

Hannity's interest in exploring the death of Seth Rich has been the latest flash point.  The D.C. establishment is particularly vehement that no questions be asked of the D.C. police, that the death remain officially a bungled robbery in which nothing was stolen and the victim was shot in the back.  Any violation of this taboo is denounced in extreme language.  Scarborough signed on to this effort in order to demonize his rival.  A week ago, Scarborough called Hannity's coverage of questions about the death "gross and repulsive" and said Hannity has "no shame."

Hannity hit back the same evening, taking aim at Scarborough and co-host Mika Brzezinski beginning an affair, leaving their spouses, and getting engaged to each other, behavior that would have gotten them fired a generation or two ago.  Mediaite:

"LOL, Joe and Mika are so cute together. Do they hold hands under the desk?" he told Mediaite, adding "That would be the only reason to watch the low rated daily emotional breakdowns they have."

With tempers frayed and controversy over President Trump raging, this feud is going to continue to escalate.  Both men probably endear themselves to their bases with it.