-As his administration deals with the aftermath
of Hurricane Irma, President Trump is also dealing
with a brewing storm within his own party
over his decision to strike a funding deal with Democrats,
prompting an absurd new round of punditry
over whether Donald Trump is actually Republican.
For more on this it's time for a closer look.
[ Cheers and applause ]
♪♪
Hurricane Irma began its assault on Florida this weekend
which meant it was time for the flapping rain jackets
of cable news
to take to the air waves
to try and describe
wind and rain.
-It feels like you are being blasted like a fire hose.
-It feels not like raindrops,
but like metal beads,
millions of them just hitting
your body at the same time.
-If you think of what a really
severe sandstorm feels like,
that's what it feels like.
It hurts.
-I feel like I'm feeling
the backwash of a jet engine.
-Just imagine a whole cup of water, but not all at once!
Just little random droplets of it hitting your body,
but way harder than you're used to!
[ Laughter ]
And then of course they reiterated the wise advice
of local officials.
-We have seen a couple of people
that have actually been
out on the beach despite
the warnings that they should not be out here.
-And there goes somebody who really shouldn't be out here.
-Tourists should not be out here.
-They certainly shouldn't be out here.
-You should not be out there!
[ Laughter and applause ]
I mean, who wants to see
Anderson Cooper soaking wet?
Oh, a lot of people? Okay.
Men and women? All right.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Now I'm realizing I do, too.
So that was stupid. Forget I said that.
There were however a few bright spots.
For one thing, there were the heroic acts
of first responders rescuing people in the storm.
Now, you think applauding the bravery of emergency responders
like the Coast Guard would be one of the easiest things
the president could do.
But even that, it seems,
is too much to ask of Donald Trump,
who praised the Coast Guard yesterday by saying this --
-A group that really deserves
tremendous credit is
the United States Coast Guard.
What they have done -- I mean they are going
right into that, and you never know.
You know, when you go in there, you don't know
if you're going to come out. They are really --
if you talk about branding,
no brand has improved more
than the United States Coast Guard.
-Branding? What are you talking about.
The Coast Guard doesn't need to improve their brand.
They're the Coast Guard. They're not Arby's.
[ Laughter ]
They're not a bunch of people around a board room table going,
"Okay, look, people hate the Coast Guard.
We need some razzle-dazzle. No idea is a bad idea!
Yes, Thompson?"
"Uh, what if they tried
rescuing people during a hurricane?"
"That's a freakin' great idea!"
[ Laughter ]
And then there were the Floridians themselves
who weathered the storm and in some cases
knew more about what was going on than the reporters.
Just watch this interview a Fox news reporter did
with an extremely well-informed resident of Miami Beach.
-What do you think about the storm, the power,
the ferocity, and the risk to your own safety at this point?
-Well, at this point, I'm very relieved to discover
that as we speak, the eye of the storm
is practically due south of us
by 220 miles.
-Yeah. -Okay. Because it's crossing
the 80th meridian,
which is 80 degrees west longitude.
So I'm not so worried
because it's so far away.
And it's bearing
as of 8:00 p.m. -- -Westbound.
-Well, not just Westbound.
It was 275 degrees.
That's only 1/15 above due west
toward true north. -Is he right?
-So, this thing is moving
and has been moving
in a very westerly direction.
And because it's several hundred miles
south, the risks are less and less.
I'm not worried.
I don't think it's going to get much worse
than what we are seeing right here.
[ Laughter, cheers, and applause ]
-Look at that reporter.
He looks like he just lost a rap battle.
That answer was amazing to everyone but her
because you know she'd heard it already.
She probably suggested they go outside
so the wind would drown him out.
"80th meridian? Yeah. That's amazing, honey.
Let's go for a walk." Then they walk outside,
and she's like, "Is that reporter asking him
about the storm? Mother [bleep]!"
[ Laughter, cheers, and applause ]
Unfortunately, not everyone
was as well informed as that guy.
Yesterday in the midst of the storm,
President Trump's Director of Social Media,
Dan Scavino, who has repeatedly attacked reporters
and accused them of spreading fake news
tweeted a video of what he said was flooding
at Miami International Airport.
Now, it was an intense scene,
so the tweet had a lot of replies,
including this one from Miami International Airport
that said...
Wow. You know you're bad at your job when even airports
are correcting you.
It's almost as bad as that time LaGuardia tweeted at Trump...
[ Laughter and applause ]
This pretty much sums up the M.O. of the Trump presidency --
Attack the media for saying things that are true,
then repeat something you saw on the Internet that's fake.
The same thing is happening with climate change.
The evidence shows that the effects of climate change
including warmer waters and sea level rise
are making these kinds of extreme weather events worse.
And yet the head of the Environmental Protection Agency,
Scott Pruitt says now is not the time
to talk about it, telling CNN...
That's like crashing your car into a telephone pole
and tell the cops, [Slurring] "This is not the time
to talk about my drinking problem."
[ Normal voice ] So if now's not the time, then when is the time?
Something tells me Donald Trump isn't making a lot of time
in his schedule to discuss climate change.
I'm pretty sure his schedule is already full.
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
Now, Trump's climate change denial is one of many areas
where he's in lockstep with most of the Republican Party.
It's a useful reminder how close Trump is to the rest
of his party, especially after a week in which he seems to be
cozing up to Democrats.
Trump stunned Republicans last week by cutting a deal
with Democrat leaders Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi
to lift the debt limit and keep the government funded
for three months.
Just to give you an idea of how unhappy
Republicans were with the president's
sudden friendship with the Democrats,
look at Mitch McConnell's face during their meeting with Trump
in the oval office last week.
He looks like he just saw a fellow ghost.
[ Laughter ]
That's what the Michelin man would look like
if you let all the air out.
[ Laughter ]
Congressional Republicans were stunned
by Trump's deal with the Democrats.
Watch how flustered Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan was
when he was asked on Sunday why Republicans were not able
to come up with a plan to convince Trump
to side with them.
-Unfortunately there wasn't
any good options presented to
the -- I learned a long time --
My background is the sport of wrestling.
You -- You don't prepare, you're not gonna --
you don't do that -- the preparation and go to pa--
We didn't even have a practice
to figure out what we were going to do.
-Your background is wrestling?
Based on that eloquent answer,
I had you pegged for the debate team.
[ Laughter ]
What did you wrestle, words?
[ Laughter ]
To be fair to Jordan,
defending Trump would make anyone's brain melt.
You see, the president is his own --
there are situations where either path --
I'm a dog guy, and we have a golden retriever, and I --
I have nothing.
[ Laughter ]
And now Trump's hostility to certain Republicans in congress
like Senators John McCain and Jeff Flake
has GOP leaders worried ahead of next year's midterms.
Texas senator John Cornyn expressed hope over the weekend
that Trump would reconcile with them.
Are you sure about that?
Remember, he thinks this is 1.5 million people.
[ Laughter and applause ]
So...
Trump got one deal with Democrats to keep the government
open and avoid financial chaos,
and now, all of a sudden,
there is a rush of praise from the media
crowning him as America's first independent President,
including headlines in The New York Times,
Associated Press, and Washington Post.
Can we stop with this absurd talking point?
Donald Trump is not an independent.
The only thing he's independent of is reality.
Whether it is his views on climate change, immigration,
race, taxes, education, or national security,
he's proven time and again that he is a Republican.
The GOP is now totally and completely the party of Trump.
Hillary Clinton summed it up this way in an interview
with CBS where she described her decision
to attend the inauguration and Trump's bleak inaugural address.
-[ Chuckling ] So there I was on the platform --
you know, feeling...
like an out of body experience.
And then his speech
which was a cry
from the white nationalist gut.
-That's right. It was a cry from the white nationalist gut.
And unfortunately for us, there is a lot of gut.
[ Laughter ]
And this is something, to her credit,
that Hillary Clinton saw coming.
Just over a year ago, she gave a speech on the rise
of white nationalism and the alt-right.
And on Sunday, we saw more of what she was warning us about
when former Trump advisor Steve Bannon slithered out
from under his rock and gave an interview to "60 Minutes",
and he responded to Hillary's alt-right speech
from August of last year with this absurd comment.
-Her very first speech when she came off the beach was nonsense.
And this goes to something I want to address with you.
Hillary Clinton is not very bright.
Everyone says she's so much smarter than Donald Trump.
-Yeah. Everybody is right.
Of course Hillary Clinton is smarter than Donald Trump.
She's a graduate of Yale Law,
a former senator and Secretary of State.
Meanwhile I'm pretty sure Trump thinks Frederick Douglas
was in Boyz II Men.
[ Laughter ]
[ As Trump ] I hear he's been recognized more and more.
I just saw him in that new Geico commercial.
[ Normal voice ] Bannon also used the "60 Minutes" interview
to announce he would be an unabashed supporter
of Trump's agenda outside the White House,
going to war with the GOP establishment on Trump's behalf.
-I'm a street fighter. That's what I am.
-You're more than that.
-Nah, I think I'm a street fighter.
By the way I think that's why Donald Trump and I
get along so well. Donald Trump is a fighter.
Great counterpuncher. Great counterpuncher.
He's a fighter.
I'm going to be his wing man outside
for the entire time.
-And to be fair, Bannon would make a great wing man
in the sense that literally anyone
would look like a catch standing next to him.
[ As Trump ] Hi, there, I'm Donald Trump.
[ Normal voice ] No, thank you. Oh, God!
I'm sorry, Donald was it?
Bannon tried to prove his credentials
as Trump's strongest ally by recounting the weekend
the infamous "Access Hollywood" tape came out
when several Republicans, including those close to Trump,
tried to urge him to drop out,
while Bannon advised him to double down.
-Did you lose confidence of anybody because they
came at you at that point and said,
"Look, he ought to get out of this race,"
other than Reince Priebus?
I mean, did your attitude
toward those people who said that --
-Absolutely. A Billy Bush Saturday to me is a litmus test.
When you side with him, you have to side with him.
And that's what Billy Bush Weekend showed me.
Billy Bush Saturday showed me
who really had Donald Trump's back.
-Well, you took names on Billy Bush Sunday, didn't you?
-I did. Christie because of Billy Bush Weekend
was not looked at for a cabinet position.
-He wasn't there for you on Billy Bush Weekend,
so therefore, he doesn't get a cabinet position?
-I told him the plane leaves at 11:00 in the morning.
If you're on the plane, you're on the team.
Didn't make the plane.
-Why do they keep saying Billy Bush Weekend?!
[ Laughter ]
It's not a holiday.
Gather around, children! Can you hear it?
It's the sound of the "Access Hollywood" bus!
Billy Bush Weekend is here! Tic Tacs for everyone!
"We celebrate Billy Bush Saturday. What about you?"
"Oh, we're a Billy Bush Sunday family."
[ Laughter ]
As much as the Republican establishment may resist,
the GOP is very much the party
of Steve Bannon and Donald Trump.
They have had plenty of chances to dump him, and they haven't.
Not after firing Comey, not after Charlottesville,
and certainly not after... -Billy Bush Weekend.
-This has been "A Closer Look."
[ Cheers and applause ]
♪♪
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