-Texas Senator Ted Cruz
refused to wear a mask when talking to reporters, and Joe Biden held his first
press conference as President. For more on this, it's time
for "A Closer Look." ♪♪ The modern conservative movement
seems concerned above all else with preserving
their solemn right to be dicks
to everyone else around them. They like to say facts
don't care about your feelings until you hurt their feelings by politely asking them
to wear a mask or stop using racist slurs, and then they melt down like they're being hobbled
by Kathy Bates. Case in point, yesterday,
a reporter politely asked Ted Cruz
to wear a mask during a press conference
inside the Capitol. Now, remember that Cruz had the
option to get vaccinated early because he's technically
a senator, even though
he looks like the guy who has to work the stockroom
at Auto Zone because he's too creepy
for the register. "Need my help out there, boss?"
"No, we're good." But most people had to wait. And while there's some
early preliminary proof that the vaccines help stop
the spread of COVID, we just still don't know
for sure, especially with the rise of several more
contagious variants. So if you're a decent
normal person and someone politely asks you
to wear a mask in their company, you do it. Ted Cruz, however, took it as yet another opportunity
to be a giant [bleep] -Yeah, when I'm talking
to the TV camera, I'm not going to wear a mask. And all of us have been
immunized, so... You're welcome to step away
if you like. -"When I'm talking
to the TV camera?" What a weird little window into
what he thinks being on TV is. "If I talk to the camera, it will tell the TVs at home
what I said. I tell secrets to the phone,
and the phone is a gossip. And the person on the other end
finds out." I'm going to start
using that myself.
Hello, I'm Seth Meyers. Welcome to "Late Night
Camera Conversation." Guess what happened to me today,
lens? Man, Ted Cruz is the Steph Curry
of being a giant dick. He never misses a shot. He's the kind of guy who would
come over to your house for a dinner party and when you politely ask him to take his feet off
the table would say, "You're welcome to leave
if you like." Again, remember,
in that situation, Ted Cruz was the one
who was vaccinated, he's the one who was unlikely
to get sick. But apparently, he couldn't
care less if anyone else
in the room got sick. I mean, God,
no wonder his neighbors ratted him out
when he went to Cancun. Do you know how unlikable
you have to be for your neighbors
to go to the press? If you invite someone to go on
vacation and their reaction is, "I'm telling<i>
The New York Times,"</i> you might be a bad guy. On "Law and Order," even when
they're investigating a murder and try to talk to neighbors, everyone opens their door
half an inch and says,
"I don't know nothing." Meanwhile, Ted Cruz's neighbors
all have lawn signs that say, "Ask me about Ted's trip
to Mexico." And as a reminder, just because
you personally get vaccinated doesn't mean the pandemic
is magically over. The virus is still circulating, there's still variants
out there, and until case numbers
are much lower and vaccination rates
are much higher, other people around you
are still at risk. And, by the way,
Cruz was also wrong about the official CDC guidance, as CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta
explained. -The CDC guidance,
I just pulled it up again because the guidance
does change, admittedly. But it says even if
you've been fully vaccinated, you need to keep taking
precautions in public places -- wearing a mask, staying six feet
apart, avoiding crowds. For him, he's pretty
well-protected, admittedly, against getting severely ill,
requiring hospitalization. He may not be as well-protected
against moderate illness, mild illness, and the possibility
that he could still transmit the virus
to somebody else. So when he's not wearing a mask, he's potentially putting other
people in that room at risk. -And that's not even
taking into account that any time you enter a room
with Ted Cruz, you're already at risk of being
in a room with Ted Cruz. Cruz, of course, doesn't care.
If Cruz thought he could score points
with the base by filling a squirt gun
with salmonella and spraying it at reporters,
he'd do it. Although I guess we shouldn't be
surprised Cruz doesn't listen to
doctors. Can you imagine
being his doctor? That's got to be a rough gig.
"I'll cough, but I'm not turning my head." Republicans have made
their opposition to masks a culture-war issue
from day one, and their antagonism
has only intensified during the Biden presidency. Last week, for example,
Kentucky Senator Rand Paul went after Dr. Anthony Fauci
at a hearing for telling people to wear masks
even after they get vaccinated, which riled up Fauci. -What studies do you have that people who have
had the vaccine or have had the infection
are spreading the infection? If we're not spreading
the infection, isn't it just theater?
-No, it's not -- -You've had the vaccine
and you're wearing two masks. Isn't that theater?
-No, it's not -- Here we go again
with the theater. -Oh, you know
you've gone too far when you get the Brooklyn
version of Fauci. Rand Paul's such a dick,
Fauci's going to show up to the next hearing
in a leather jacket, jet-black hair,
and a switchblade. "Where you going, Tony?" "There's a fellow from Kentucky
who's about to be unlucky." "What are you saying?" "He's about to get
a Fauci ouchie!" Seriously, guys, we're just
asking you politely, please, just wear a mask. Why can't you just be courteous
to the people around you instead of melting down
like children? They're the people who show up
to Long John Silver's without shoes and,
when they get turned away say, "Oh, I guess we're living
in Nazi Germany now. I guess the secret police are
just gonna come take me away for the crime
of not wanting my feet to sweat while I eat my breaded shrimp." This is the kind
of culture-war BS the right has been obsessed with
for the first two months of Biden's presidency. And that's because his response to the coronavirus pandemic has been overwhelmingly popular
so far, as has his $1.9 trillion
COVID relief bill. So Republicans have had trouble
coming up with an attack on him. For example, they've been
obsessing over the fact that, until today, Biden hadn't
held a formal press conference. And look, I'm all for
press conferences, but it all depends on
who's giving them. Press conferences
under the last guy didn't exactly contain a lot
of newsworthy information. You could get the same value
from watching open testimony at a New York City
council hearing on public access television. "Yeah, good evening,
council members. My name's Mickey.
I'm from Kew Gardens. And my proposal is we replace
the Statue of Liberty with a statue of Roscoe
the Bed Bug Dog." Also, can I just say, hearing there's a presidential
press conference is about as exciting
as in Monopoly when you win second place
in the beauty contest. It's like, "Okay,
I guess it's money. But how'd the old man win? Who else was in that
beauty contest, a foot?" And because Fox couldn't find
anything else to jump on, they decided to spend weeks obsessing over the whole
press conference thing. -President Biden has now
been in office 43 days and has not held a single
solo press conference? -No-show Joe Biden has
been in office 43 days, still has not held
a single press conference since becoming President. -Biden has yet to hold
a solo press conference since he took office
now 46 days ago. -He has not had
a press conference in 48 days. -48 days and counting. -We are halfway
into the first 100 days, and President Biden still has
not held a solo news conference. -Why hasn't he had
a solo press conference? That's the big question. Is it like the campaign where
he was hiding in the basement? -That was his strategy
all the way along, hide in the basement, don't talk
to the American people. Now get to the White House, hide
in another figurative basement, his Oval Office. -Wait, so is the Oval Office, the most famous room
in the world, now a figurative basement? Once these people come up
with a line they like, they never let go of it
no matter how dumb it is. They're more desperate
to use the "basement" line than George Costanza was
to use his "jerk store" line. Hannity's going to start doing
all his monologues with a giant bowl of shrimp. Also, at least Biden
goes to the Oval Office. Trump spent less time there
than a White House tour group. Catching Trump
in the Oval Office was like catching a station
agent at a subway stop. "Excuse me, the machines are
down, and I need to buy a card." "Sorry, shift's over.
I'll be back next leap year." They've made such a big deal
out of this press conference that yesterday Fox News White
House correspondent Peter Doocey said he had tons of questions
prepared. -Do you have a good question
ready? -I have a binder
full of questions. -Is it a Lisa Frank
trapper-keeper? "Mr. President, I have
a two-part question. Will you sign my yearbook, and
will you have a great summer? Thank you, and keep in touch." Fox has also been full of absurd
and baseless speculation about what would happen
at this press conference. At one point earlier this month,
Fox host Stuart Varney predicted that
all of Biden's answers would be pre-written
on a teleprompter. -What kind of press conference
will it be? Will he have a teleprompter? Will he know the questions
in advance? Will he call on friends
and reporters only? I do believe there'll be
a teleprompter there which you can just turn on
when you need the set response. That would not surprise me
at all. And I wouldn't be surprised,
as you say, a staffer saying, "You ask this question,
you ask that question." I can see that
coming a mile off. -Maybe Fox News
just can't believe that a President would be able
to give a coherent answer to a question
without a teleprompter. "He must have had a script. He didn't suggest
chugging bleach once." Also, at least Biden can read
off a teleprompter without wincing like Rocky in the 15th round
with Apollo Creed. Whenever Trump read
off a teleprompter, he had the pained look
of a high school sophomore being forced to watch a video
on how babies are born. And Biden did start off
his press conference by making an announcement, that he would be doubling
his original goal of 100 million shots in the first 100 days
of his presidency. -On December 8th,
I indicated that I hoped to get 100 million shots
in people's arms in my first 100 days. We met that goal last week
by day 58, 42 days ahead of schedule. Now today,
I'm setting a second goal, and that is, we will,
by my 100th day in office, have administered 200 million
shots in people's arms. That's right, 200 million shots
in 100 days. I know it's ambitious,
twice our original goal. But no other country in
the world has even come close, not even close,
to what we're doing. I believe we can do it. -So he set a goal, met it, then said set a second,
more ambitious goal, which has credibility
because he met his first goal. That's a novel strategy. It's certainly different
from the Trump strategy of overpromising
and under-delivering. If Trump had won a second term, he'd promise 200 million shots
by May 1st and end up giving out
200 million NFTs of shots by May 1st. "Every American will receive
a non-fungible token, which is a high-resolution image
of a vaccine shot. It will be available for the
low, low cost of $69 million, or for an even $70 million,
we'll throw in a gif of a sparkly cat
playing with some yarn." That kind of announcement
is Biden at his best, when he's got the vibe
of an old-timer football coach giving his young squad an
inspirational halftime speech. "We can do it, folks. We can score 42 points
in the second half. And look, I know most of you
have broken bones because I forgot to teach you
how to tackle, but that's how we learn." That's when Biden's at his best. On the other hand,
he gets a little off track when he trails off, like he did at the end
of an answer on immigration. -We're building back up
the capacity that should have been maintained
and built upon that Trump dismantled. It's going to take time. And the other thing we're doing,
I might add -- Am I giving you
too long an answer? Because if you don't
want the detail -- No, no, but, I mean,
I don't know how much detail you want
about immigration. Maybe I'll stop there. -Yeah, we all know the press
famously hates the details. That's like a witness in
a courtroom telling the judge, "I mean, I know where
the bodies are buried, but you guys probably
all have dinner plans." And look,
it's absolutely frustrating that the mainstream media
has essentially laundered GOP talking points
by making it sound like there's a political crisis or national security crisis
on the border or that Biden created it
out of thin air or ludicrously asking him
if he moved too quickly in undoing Trump's cruel
and inhumane and dysfunctional
border policies. But on the other hand,
there is a very real humanitarian situation
on the border with unaccompanied minors who are fleeing poverty
and violence and exercising their legal right
to asylum. They deserve safety and aid and to be treated
compassionately and humanely. And to his credit, Biden did say
they should be treated humanely. We're capable of having all of
those thoughts at the same time. And I know that's a change
from the Trump era, when our brains were so fried,
we were incapable of having even one thought
at a time. For most of the Trump era,
my brain was so overloaded, I forgot my kids' names.
I just called them Guy and Dude or Lev and Igor. The moment Trump left office,
I suddenly remembered my ATM pin
and my wedding anniversary, which is why her present
was $200 in $20s. And there were some other
weird moments, too, like when Biden was asked
about the tidal wave of GOP voter suppression laws
Republicans have unleashed, the most ferocious nationwide
assault on voting rights since Jim Crow, with more than 250 anti-voting
bills across 43 states. Biden correctly
pointed that out but then went for an odd line
that I'm not sure made sense. -What I'm worried about
is how un-American this whole initiative is. It's sick. It's sick. And so, I'm convinced that
we'll be able to stop this, because it is
the most pernicious thing -- This makes Jim Crow
look like Jim Eagle. -Jim Eagle? You talking about the Muppet? Jim Eagle sounds like a
desperate guess on "Jeopardy!" for the question, "He was the
lead singer of the Eagles." "Well, I know Jim Floyd was
the lead singer of Pink Floyd." Also, you know
there's a dude out there whose name is actually Jim Eagle
watching this saying, "What the [bleep]
Now I gotta change my name." I'm just kidding.
If there is a real man named Jim Eagle, he's not watching TV
in the afternoon. Based on his name, he's probably
building a concrete dam with his bare hands. "Hey, Jim, the President
just said your name!" "Jim Eagle doesn't have time
for such foolishness." [ Laughter ] But whatever you thought
of Biden's press conference, it was certainly refreshing
to see a President directly answer
reporters' questions without attacking anyone
or melting down. And, hey, Republicans, if you
didn't like his answers... -You're welcome to step away
if you like. -This has been "A Closer Look." ♪♪ God's Love We Deliver
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