Chris Matthews Apologizes to Bernie Sanders For Comparing His Campaign To Nazis: "I Was Wrong"

MSNBC's Chris Matthews issued an apology to Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday for his much derided comment comparing Sanders winning the Nevada caucus to France falling to the Nazis in 1940.

"I was reading last night about the fall of France in the summer of 1940, and the general, Renault, calls up Churchill and says, 'It’s over.’ And Churchill says ‘How can it be? You’ve got the greatest army in Europe. How can it be over?’ He said, ‘It’s over.' So I had that suppressed feeling," Matthews said Saturday after Sanders was declared the clear winner.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: As I watched the one-sided results of Saturday’s Democratic caucus in Nevada, I reached for a historical analogy and used a bad one. I was wrong to refer to an event from the first days of World War II. Senator Sanders, I’m sorry for comparing anything from that tragic error in which so many suffered, especially the Jewish people, to an electoral result in which you were the well-deserved winner. This is going to be a hard-fought heated campaign of ideas. In the days and weeks and months ahead, I will strive to do a better job myself of elevating the political discussion.