Chris Matthews Unglued? Badgers Conservative Guest With 'Who's Paying Your Salary?' More Than 10 Times

MSNBC

MSNBC's Chris Matthews seemed to come unglued Tuesday night, badgering a conservative guest and repeatedly demanding to know, "Who's paying your salary?" during a segment about Michigan's new right-to-work law.

Scott Hagerstrom answered Matthews right from the start that he works for Americans for Prosperity, an anti-tax and government spending organization. Matthews, however, was bent on getting Hagerstrom to admit the group's ties to the conservative billionaire Koch brothers -- and asked him a variation of the same question more than 10 times.

"You work for the Koch brothers, they don't like unions, why are you working for them?" Matthews demanded.

"I work for Americans for Prosperity," Hagerstrom responded. "This is not about the Koch brothers this is about -- "

"Well, who's paying your salary?" Matthews said.

"I work for Americans for Prosperity," Hagerstrom repeated. "We're a nonprofit."

"Who's paying your salary?" Matthews said again.

Hagerstrom said he came on the show to talk about policy, to which Matthews responded, "Who's paying your salary to do what you're doing right now?"

"I just told you, Americans for Prosperity," Hagerstrom said.

"What's that?" Matthews asked, adding a few moments later, "You're not answering my question."

Watch the full segment below, via MSNBC. NewsBusters has an abridged version (scroll):