-The Republican Party has
decided that its path back to power is complete and
total fealty to Donald Trump, and they're purging anyone
who refuses to repeat his lies about the 2020 election, no matter how destructive
it is for the country. For more on this,
it's time for A Closer Look. ♪♪ It is exceedingly rare
in the history of this country for a political party
to stay so closely tied to an ex-president, let alone one who is as deeply
unpopular as Donald Trump. What we're seeing right now
in the Republican Party is not usually how
the process unfolds after a party loses power,
especially in a landslide, amid a once-in-a-century
cataclysm. And let's remember,
the GOP didn't just lose, they got wiped out.
They lost the presidency and both houses of Congress. Trump never once cracked
50 percent job approval and never won
the popular vote. Meanwhile, President Biden is
riding high with a 63 percent approval ratings
in a new poll out today. The GOP is treating Trump
like a good luck charm even after he brought
them terrible luck. If the first time Dumbo
tried to fly, he plummeted to the ground
and broke all four legs and both ears, he would have let
go of the feather. And yet the GOP is still fully
enthralled to Trump, who oversaw the worst economic
crash and unemployment crisis in a century,
rising poverty and child hunger, and a disastrous
pandemic response that left hundreds of thousands
of Americans dead. Not to mention that violent
insurrection where he incited a mountain of rioters
to ransack the Capitol and disrupt the lawful
counting of electoral votes. You remember that?
Somehow it feels like it was approximately
800 years ago when in reality
it happened in January. Now Trump's shuffling
around his golf course like it never happened,
popping up in photos like a retired bigfoot
and interrupting weddings and other private events
to drone on about his deranged belief that he actually
won the election. -The former president himself
is still waxing poetic about finding irregularities
right around the corner, apparently living
in an alternate reality down at Mar-a-Lago. -Watch Arizona,
some very interesting things are happening in Arizona, right?
You know about that. And we just had a great ruling
or actually the Senate the State Senate of Arizona. Let's see what they find,
I wouldn't be surprised if they found thousands and thousands
and thousands of votes. So we're going to watch
that very closely. And after that you'll watch
Pennsylvania you'll watch Georgia,
and you're going to watch Michigan and Wisconsin.
We get 75 million votes. Nobody's ever gotten that. They said,
"Get 66 million votes, sir. And the election's over," well,
I got 75 million. And they said --
well, you saw what happened. 10:30 in the evening
all of a sudden they said "That's a strange thing. Why are they closing up
certain place?" A lot of things
happening right now. I just want to say
it's an honor to be here. It's an honor to have you
at Mar-a-Lago. You are a great
and beautiful couple. -In fairness to Trump,
it's very hard to do stand up comedy
when you're opening for a band. I mean, he's just going
from room to room at Mar-a-Lago, interrupting the most
sacred moments in people's lives to whine
about his election loss. Like Bill Murray
with a head injury. [ As Trump ] You're going to
find thousands of votes in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin,
Arizona. A lot of things are happening with the mail ballots
and the signature matches. I said you got
to get the signatures. And they say,
"Sir, we can't, sir." And I say "That's. That's a
strange thing, isn't it? Anyway, enjoy the bris. Let me know if you need a mohel. I got a guy so good, so good.
He also cuts Rudy's hair." [ Normal voice ]
Although I'm guessing if you hold a wedding reception
at Mar-a-Lago at this point, you're counting
on Trump popping in. It's like having a birthday
party at Chuck E. Cheese. The rat better be there or
there's going to be hell to pay. "What do you mean
it's Chuck's days off?" "Well, technically,
he's in the shop because he had
a mechanical error that made it look like he was
giving kids a middle finger. But they like tell him
he has the day off." "what am I supposed to tell
my son whose birthday it is and he was dying to meet
Chuck E. Cheese?" "You could tell him
Jasper T. Jowls is still here." "Nobody likes Jasper T. Jowls!" "Also, sometimes Donald Trump
rolls through and complains about Brad Raffensperger." And by the way,
that insane Arizona audit he referenced is the same one
you may have heard where Republicans are reportedly
searching for bamboo on ballots to find out if they were
smuggled in from Asia. -The other day
at the press conference, you were talking about bamboo.
What was that about? -Well, is that there's
accusations of 40,000 ballots were flown in.
-To Arizona? -To Arizona, and it was stuffed
into the box, okay? And it came from the southeast
part of the world, Asia, okay. And and what they're doing
is to find out if there's bamboo in the paper.
That camera right there that they take a picture
of the ballot. If you -- they can really
look at depth and find out, is it a hand-marked paper ballot
because it's a 5k camera. -And why do you check for
bamboo? -Because they use bamboo
in their paper processing, -Who's they?
-People in Southeast Asia. -They're using a 5k camera
to find out if there's bamboo in the paper to see if the ballots
came from Southeast Asia. Imagine going to Best Buy to
get the camera and explaining. That's what it's for. "Are you looking for something
for your family photos or something more professional?"
"Well, I'm looking for something that can detect strands
of bamboo on ballots. Why are you calling
store security? Is that bamboo
in your shirt? Guys? They're on to me.
Oh, damn it. Um, do you also have those,
like, secret wrist microphones?" Also, what a waste
of a 5k camera. This is an actual
television show, and I'm pretty sure we have,
at best, 1.5k's. I don't even know what the "K"
in 5k stands for. I tried to find out,
but whenever I asked, my crew tells me it stands for "It's none of your [Bleep]
business, 'kay." [ Laughter ] When I was in my attic
during quarantine, I had to film myself
on my own iPad because NBC refused to send
actual TV cameras to my house. They said a 5k camera
would be wasted on bits about "The Thornburgs," a magic door,
and the wasps I befriended. And they definitely
did not like the sea captain. The programing execs sat me down
and said to me, And this is true, "Why won't the
sea captain work for a dolphin?" And I said, "Why?" And they said,
"Because he serves no porpoise." [ Laughs ] Who let the sea captain
write a joke? For real. In May? By the way,
just to clarify, the guy who explained
that whole insane bamboo ballot theory
doesn't believe it. As he explained later
in the interview. -So that you feel like --
-That's what they say. -40,000 ballots have been--? -Yeah, I don't believe
any of that. I'm just saying that is
part of the mystery that we want to un-gaslight
like people about. And this is a way to do it.
-This part of what you're looking at for it.
-I'm not. They are. -Poor guy.
These people are so crazy that if you explain
what they believe, people think you are crazy.
They're crazy, is airborne. For some reason, it fell to him
to explain to the press what these people
are looking for. It's like coming home from work
and trying to calmly explain to your wife
that you're late for dinner because the guy in the F train
pulled the emergency brake because he thought a cockroach
stole his cigarette. So he claimed, and again,
these are his words, a cockroach came up to him and asked him for directions
to the nearest OTB. And while he was looking,
again his words, the cockroach reached
into his pocket and stole his Marlboro Light. I don't know.
That's what he said. [ Deep voice ] Sorry.
It's a true story. I just needed a smoke.
I'm a little stressed out. The Mets can't hit with runners
in scoring position. This cigarette tastes weird,
is this bamboo? Does anyone on the train
have that 5k camera? [ Normal voice ]
Anyway, the point is, this is what the Republican
Party has committed itself to. Most political parties
would move on and engage in some level of introspection
and self assessment after being repeatedly rejected
by a majority of voters and losing power entirely. They'd also move on
from a president who was both deeply unpopular
and left the nation in ruins. Instead, Republicans are
intensifying their devotion to Trump. They're in the process
right now, pushing Wyoming Congressman Liz Cheney
out of a leadership role simply because she affirmed
the basic reality -- Trump lost the election -- and called the idea
that it was stolen from him a toxic lie
that undermines democracy. And again,
as I've said many times now, I did not want to side
with Liz Cheney. She's not a hero. She's a pro-war
torture apologist who stood by Trump in 2016 and during his first
impeachment trial and helped build the modern GOP
into what it is today. She's as much to blame
for the rise of Trump-ism as anyone else
in Republican leadership. I don't want to support her
any more than I want to hang out with Jasper T. Jowls. It's just that now
she's being purged for simply stating the reality
that Trump lost and there was
no widespread fraud. And now Republicans
want to replace her with New York Congresswoman
Elise Stefanik, a Trump loyalist
who has repeated his debunked election lies and said last week
on Steve Bannon's podcast that she supports the
nutty Arizona election audit. -What are your thoughts about
what's going on in Arizona? -I fully support
the audit in Arizona. -We want transparency and
answers for the American people. What are the Democrats
so afraid of? The voters in Arizona
and the state Senate in Arizona pursued this audit.
I fully support it. Transparency is a good thing. We need to fix these election
security issues going into the future. -What election security issues?
Strands of bamboo on ballots smuggled in from Asia.
What's next? We're also using a 5k camera to look for microscopic
marinara stains to make sure no ballots were
secretly smuggled in from Italy? I personally witnessed
an Antifa fraudster sneak into the counting room
with a calzone stuffed with pepperoni
and fraudulent ballots. This is all that matters
in today's GOP. Your willingness to repeat
Trump's deranged lies about the election
and codify them into law
through voter suppression bills that will let Republicans
steal the next election. That's why Florida Governor
Ron DeSantis was on "Fox News" last week
signing a voter suppression bill surrounded by fawning
Trump fans. Over the weekend,
GOP Congressman Jim Banks said he supported Cheney's
ouster and essentially accused her of abandoning Republicans
by acknowledging reality. -Do you still question
whether or not Joe Biden won the election fair
and square and got over 270 electoral votes
fair and square? -Yeah, Chris, I stand by my vote
to object on January 6th. I stand by the Texas lawsuit
because I have serious concerns about how the election
in November was was carried out. -When Liz Cheney says history
is watching and you can't go forward
until you resolve this question. The election
was fair and square. Donald Trump
played a negative role. You think she's misguided
making those points? -Yeah. I've called on Liz Cheney
to rejoin the Republican team and help us go out
and win the majority in the midterm election. -"I've called Liz Cheney
to rejoin the Republican team
to acknowledge that there are serious
concerns about the election and to admit that we are,
in fact, living in The Matrix. That's why I'm supporting
as her replacement Morpheus, who has made
some very persuasive points about voter fraud.
And he knows kung fu. Learned it in a day."
But listen to what he said, that's actually a fairly
shocking admission. He essentially said Cheney
is abandoning Republicans
by acknowledging reality. Meaning that there
are two separate things. Republicans don't
live in reality. In fact, in order to be a member
of this Republican Party, you have to abandon reality. It's like insisting
to your children that the guy
in the Mickey Mouse costume is the actual Mickey Mouse. Even though your kids
are now thirty five years old, "You can either
rejoin this family on our annual trip to
Typhoon Lagoon and acknowledge that Mickey Mouse
is a real person. Or you can get
the hell out of here. And are you smoking another
one of those bamboo cigarettes? Did you steal that
from a cockroach?" [ Deep voice ] Guilty. [ Normal voice ]
Is that as popular a recurring
character that we think it is? Cigarette smoking cockroach? We'll find out
on the old comments. [ Laughter ] And even, by the way,
we did a full clip about Donald Trump
crashing weddings. No Vince Vaughn. That's restraint. And even Republicans
who are no longer in office, like Chris Christie, are blaming
Cheney for her choice to simply live in reality rather than Republicans
for lying about the election and dismantling democracy. -I think Liz is doing
what she wants to do. I don't think Liz wants to
be in leadership anymore, because once she won
the vote earlier, she continued to press
this issue publicly in a way that was antagonizing
the people who were against her. And I think you don't have an
entitlement to be in leadership. -Think about how sad it is to still be loyal
to a guy like Trump after everything he put
Chris Christie through, among all the other humiliations
Christie suffered. Trump once forced him to eat
meat loaf at the White House, a place where they famously will
literally make anything for you. "Mr. Christie,
before you order, we have the most exquisite
culinary creations you can imagine
from a chef who lives here
on the premises." [ As Trump ] He'll have the
meatloaf. Bring him a side of ketchup. And Christie is
still sticking by Trump. Maybe that's what
you have to do to keep your job
in this Republican Party. In order to demonstrate
your fealty to Trump, you have to lie
about the election and eat a giant plate
of meatloaf on TV while he insults your wife
and your dad and then, for good measure,
kicks you in the balls. [ As Giuliani ] Don't worry,
boss, I'm wearing a cup. It's great
because it doubles as a mask. [ Normal voice ]
Any sane political party
would move on from a president who is both deeply unpopular, lost by a wide margin,
and, on top of everything else, left nothing but misery
and destruction in his wake. And yet, Republicans
are not moving on. They're doubling down. There as committed
to Trump as ever, and now they don't care much
about how they have to lie or debase themselves
to prove their loyalty to him. Republicans are looking
at Trump's election lies in their own voter suppression
bills and saying -- -You are a
great and beautiful couple. -This has been A Closer Look. ♪♪ God's Love We Deliver
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