Tuesday night brought us a cavalcade of late-night hosts being unable to understand just how baffling Donald Trump’s meeting with Kim Jong Un was. Trump didn’t botch it, exactly, but also he couldn’t stop saying nice things about the guy and apparently did not win the negotiations at all. During a new “A Closer Look” segment, Seth Meyers had a hard time comprehending all of it, from the fact that it was happening at all to one comment Trump made that would have been an absolutely hilarious joke if it had been intended as one.
“No matter your feelings on Donald Trump, he is currently attempting diplomacy over war, which is undeniably the better option. That said, I do have some concerns based on some things Donald Trump did and said yesterday, and also based on the fact that he’s Donald Trump,” Meyers said to open Tuesday’s “A Closer Look.”
Over the course of the 12-minute segment, which is long for an “A Closer Look,” Meyers often expressed bewilderment at the images of Trump and Kim together — they were certainly very awkward.
“Trump and Kim then sat down for a one-on-one meeting, and look at Kim’s face. Is it just me, or is even he confused at how he got here? It looks like they got set up on a blind date by their weirdest friend. Oh what, they were?” Meyers said, as an image of Dennis Rodman appeared onscreen.
Meyers took particular exception to the compliments Trump repeatedly paid Kim during the summit and afterward for no real reason. “Late Night” pulled up a clip of Trump saying that you know Kim has to be great just because of how young he was when he took over, which set Meyers off.
“What are you talking about? This is a guy who starves his own citizens and assassinates people with anti-aircraft guns. You’re talking about him like he started Apple in his garage,” Meyers said. “But I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that Trump’s idea of talent is getting rich by taking over your dad’s business. Trump was born on third base, whereas Kim was born on third base and then shot the third baseman. In fact, Trump seemed as interested in looking forward at potential business opportunities in North Korea as he was in getting Kim to give up his nuclear weapons.”
The next clip that “Late Night” showed was Trump making a comment that had Meyers completely stunned. “They have great beaches. You see that whenever they’re exploding their cannons into the ocean. I say, boy look at that beach,” he said. “Wouldn’t that make a great condo here, And I explained, I said, you know, instead of doing that you could have the best hotels in the world right there. Think of it from a real estate perspective.”
“He accidentally told a great f—ing joke,” Meyers said, visibly upset. “I mean, ‘They have great beaches. You can see it when they’re exploding their cannons into the oceans’ is a great f—ing joke. That would be like me coming to work today and saying, ‘I accidentally signed a treaty.’
“Even when he’s in the middle of a summit over nuclear weapons, he’s still trying to sell his f—ing hotel timeshare. ‘If you give up your nuclear weapons now you can stay one night free at my new Trump Hotel Pyongyang.’ But, again, diplomacy with North Korea is undeniably a good thing. It is a very good thing. It’s vastly preferably to fiery rhetoric and threats of nuclear war. The problem isn’t that Trump is engaging in diplomacy. The problem is that he doesn’t know what he’s doing, and only cares about optics.”
You can watch all of the “A Closer Look” segment from Tuesday’s episode of “Late Night with Seth Meyers” in the video embedded at the top of this post.