- (Kanye) And you make a Superman...
- What? (laughs) What? What's this dude talking about?
- At least there's memes to help people, you know,
deal with reality.
♪ (punk rock intro) ♪
- (narrator) A surreal scene in the Oval Office today
with Kanye West embracing... - Oh god! Oh!
- (narrator) ...Kanye West embracing President Trump.
- That's wild. - Oh my god. This is stupid [bleep].
- (Kanye) I love this guy right here.
- I have a lot of things to say about this.
- (narrator) The President somehow finding the time for a private meeting
and lunch with the controversial rapper
and loyal Trump supporter that devolved
into an incoherent, televised rant. - Hmm.
- I didn't actually see it, but I heard about it.
- (narrator) He came to the White House for a private meeting
on prison reform. - Kanye, you gotta take
that hat off, bro. - (narrator) ...that capped off
his appearance by cursing in the Oval Office
as the President smiled. - (makes disgusted noise)
- (Kanye) ...journey right now.
And he might not have expected to have a crazy [bleep]
like Kanye West... - You're just gonna cuss
in front of the President like that? (laughs)
- That place where he's sitting, it's a place of honor.
Important people go there, and he's just gonna talk like that?
Like, really?! - (Kanye) ...best believe we are
gonna make America great. - I don't get why he's doing this.
- Dude, that is so unexpected that Kanye out of all people
would love Donald Trump. - This is definitely just hilarious
for me as a hip-hop fan. It's just another thing
that's making American politics look like a [bleep] reality TV show.
- (Kanye) You know, they tried to scare me to not wear this hat,
my own friends. But this hat, it gives me--
it gives me power in a way. - Yeah. (laughs)
- (Kanye) ...it gives me power... - It gives you power?
- (Kanye) My dad and my mom separated, so I didn't have a lot of male energy
in my home. - Okay, I feel that. Same.
- (Kanye) I'm married to a female that, um, you know...
- (chuckles) Yeah. - (Kanye) There's not a lot
of male energy going on. - Okay. Get to your point, sir!
- The fact that Trump looks like he's actually listening
to what he's saying, it's, like...
- (Kanye) You know, I love Hillary. I love everyone, right?
But the campaign, "I'm with her" just didn't make me feel,
as a guy that didn't get to see my dad all the time,
like a guy that could play catch with his son.
- That makes sense. - (Kanye) ...a guy that could
play catch with his son. - Okay, I feel that.
I kind of-- I feel him a little bit on that.
- (Kanye) It made me feel like Superman.
- Oh my god. - (Kanye) That's my favorite superhero.
- What is he even saying? - What? (laughs)
What? What's this dude talking about? (chuckles)
- (Kanye) And also, as a guy that looks up to you,
looks up to Ralph Lauren, looks up to American industry guys...
- He doesn't know how the economy works.
I can tell already. - (Kanye) ...however you wanna do it,
five seconds delay, and just goes in and gets it done.
Right now... - Yeah, I agree with him.
- (Kanye) And I think the way the universe works is perfect.
We don't have 13 floors, do we? You know, so, the...
- (laughs) Trump's like, "You hear this dude?"
- (Kanye) Also, at that point, it was illegal for blacks to read
or African Americans to read... - Yeah.
- I'm just so livid Kanye's actually doing this,
and he's being so serious. - (Kanye) So, that meant
if you actually read the amendment, you'd get locked up
(claps) and turned to a slave! - Wait, hold up.
Isn't the 13th Amendment about slavery?
Kanye wants to get rid of the 13th Amendment.
It doesn't make sense at all.
- Everything he said about how that hat just empowers him,
and like-- it's kind of like wearing a cape kind of.
- Deep down, Kanye West is--
has a great ideology.
He's trying to help his people, and that's great.
Ah, just the way that he's doing it is so wrong.
- Kanye is just-- he lacked that male figure
in his life early on. And he was talking about that just now,
and I actually grew up the same way. But I feel like he definitely
shouldn't be going for someone like Trump,
who's a little bit too extreme masculine
to solve that issue. - (Kanye) I brought a--
I brought a gift with me right here. - He just showed his password
on the news. - Uhh, we all know his password,
of course. The meme. - (Kanye) This right here is
the iPlane 1. It's a hydrogen-powered airplane...
- Trump doesn't even care. (chuckles) - This is just all over the place.
- (Kanye) ...should be flying in. Look at this, Jared.
- Kanye's not a [bleep] rocket scientist.
Why is he saying that? - (Trump) We'll get rid of
Air Force One. Can we get rid of... - (chuckles) That's funny.
- He's just proposing a bunch of things now.
He went from one thing to a plane. (laughs)
How did that happen?
- (Kanye) It's not that I don't like-- what I-- what I need
Saturday Night Live to improve on or what I need the liberals
to improve on is... - Oh, he'll listen to this.
- (Kanye) ...Saturday Night Live... - (laughs) I'm sorry.
It does not look like Trump is following AT. ALL.
- I feel like he's sitting there. He's like, "Wow.
This guy's a freaking idiot." Like, (chuckles) dude,
I would if I was Trump! - (Kanye) If he don't look good,
we don't look good. - Yeah.
- Looking good has nothing to do with jobs
or making America great again. - (Kanye) This is our president!
He has to be the freshest, the flyest...
- That's true. I mean, I see that. I mean, we should--
even though we don't believe in what he's saying,
he is still the representative of our country.
- He's really spastic. He's all over the place.
- Deep in my heart, I feel like maybe he's trolling.
Maybe the real Kanye's in there somewhere.
- (Kanye) So, I actually brought some hats in that have a bit
of a transition... - (chuckles) Oh no.
- (Kanye) I made a hat that says, "Make America Great," just that.
But I would love to see, at the Super Bowl,
Trump wearing the Make America Great hat,
Colin making-- wearing
the Make America Great... - What? (laughs)
- (Kanye) ...we can learn how to be malleable
in the infinite universe that we are and the loving beings that we are.
- Yeah. That makes sense. Trying to come together
as a group of people, not just separate parties, you know?
Just, like, make America great. - (Kanye) A hug right here.
I love this guy right here. - Uhh, it's so awkward.
- Wait, that was so awkward. - I don't think what they're doing
is really gonna affect us that much. I think it's just publicity.
- He's making a mockery out of the rap game
and especially out of Americans, and, you know, people of color,
especially black Americans. I feel like he's kind of
just making a mockery of this. And just him being so--
like, supporting Trump and being with him,
it's kind of like-- I don't know. It's kind of a joke.
- I just don't feel a sense of these are two equals
meeting at this point, shaking hands.
It's like Kanye's a fanboy and Trump is there.
Like, "Oh, that's real nice." - Make America great?
That just-- that phrase is just out of the picture
for most Americans now. So, if he can change it,
maybe we can come to some middle ground.
I agree, but realistically, it ain't gonna happen.
- (FBE) So, following this meeting, the internet had a frenzy.
So, here are some of the reactions, and, of course, some memes.
- Ooh, this is gonna be fun.
- (chuckles) Trump with cornrows,
I would never expect to see that in my life. That's hilarious.
- Bro. That's so well made. Why does that look real?
- I think we should be laughing as a normal reaction,
but we should definitely understand that there's a deeper meaning
to this and that we're all screwed.
- Kind of makes me laugh, just how pathetic it is.
It's straight up pathetic that this is going on.
- "You're such a [bleep] president." ♪ I love it ♪
- "You such a [bleep] president. I love it."
Ohhh! Oh, 'cause the song! - This is a freaking train wreck.
Like... ugh. What?!
- At least there's memes to help people, you know,
deal with reality. - "Letting Kanye just
say wild [bleep] in the Oval Office
is one of Trump's best accomplishments so far."
- I don't know about that one, but okay. Okay.
He's done some pretty good stuff. Like, look at the stock market.
It went up! - Well, it's because he has so little.
That's sad. That's your greatest achievement,
just having some dude come in and talk about--
he doesn't even know what he's talking about.
- "In case you missed it, here's Kanye West
unlocking his phone using the most unsecure passcode imaginable."
(laughs) Zero, zero, zero, zero, zero.
- Yeah, it was zero, zero, zero, zero. I saw that-- I saw that part.
- (giggles) Okay, that's kind of funny.
- (laughs) This is a-- That's a good one.
- Ohh! (laughs) It's like a little kid showing,
like, his dad what he drew in class.
- Comedy helps with bad seriousness and gets the topic out
of everyone's mind and just kind of makes people laugh
and be happy. But people need to also
do something about it instead of just making memes.
- (FBE) What are your overall thoughts on Kanye's meeting
with the President of the United States?
- I would never have thought that would happen in a million years,
but now that it has happened, I think it's great.
Why not have different sides of the story?
- The teens that are awake know this not right.
And the teens that are just a product of their environment
are obviously gonna be like, "This is what it is."
You know, "This is normal." This is how things are supposed to be
when they don't see the bigger picture.
- This presidency overall has really altered what I think
of American presidents.
I feel like presidencies are very casual now.
And so, it is a little weird.
- Kanye and his meeting could have definitely had
a very big impact on the nation. And then he just flushed it
down the toilet! And he just... he didn't--
He wasted it! He wasted it!
He had so many things that he could've said
that represent so many people!
It just shows the current state of America.
- (FBE) So, since Donald Trump became president, it seems
that there are a lot of big viral moments like this
and the things the President tweets about.
Does your generation see this as the new norm for the presidency?
- Yeah. A lot of my generation doesn't really take politics
as serious anymore just because it is so casual
and it is such a joke now almost in America.
And so, I don't know how many teens or people in this generation
are gonna to follow politics, because it is such a game now.
- (FBE) So, Kanye's not the only major celebrity recently
to make his political views very public.
Just a little while ago, after years of silence
about her political views, Taylor Swift urged her fans
to go out and vote in an Instagram post,
specifically for a Democrat in her home state of Tennessee.
Then when winning an award, she used her speech
to tell people to vote. The Instagram post alone
allegedly caused a surge of 65,000 new voter registrations.
- Yup. I know about that. I'm not saying just 'cause
she's from country music she has to be a Republican,
but I feel the stuff that they sing about and stuff
is more on the right side than the left.
- (FBE) So, last question, what do you think about the role
celebrities play in politics right now?
- It's very good. It's great. At least--
they're using their power for good.
- It's really good for them to be posting all of that information
and telling their fans what to do and stuff,
'cause fans for celebrities and stuff will do anything they say.
- Some people are doing it right, like Taylor Swift.
And I know that Kesha was also pushing for people to vote.
And I think that that's great. But when people like Kanye go up
and do unprofessional things like that,
it makes everything worse, I feel.
- I don't think it's necessarily too far that a lot of celebrities
are pushing certain political parties on their fans,
because that's just one person's bias, and it has so much power
that it's kind of not fair to the people
who aren't doing research themself.
- I'm 18 now, and I'm eligible to vote.
And I haven't, you know, registered to vote.
And I feel like I'm kind of being a hypocrite.
Voting locally is good, and I feel like that's where
we can have the most change first.
- There's so many countries out there who can't vote,
who literally do not have a right. And so, for us to not vote
is taking something for granted that we fought for.
- Kids should start learning about politics and the way things work
as early as they possibly can, 'cause it's a very unique type
of intelligence is political intelligence.
And I think a lot of people would be much smarter politically
if they got into it at a younger age.
- Celebrities oftentimes are very misinformed, just like Kanye.
He had no freaking clue what he was talking about.
But I think it's great that they're getting people
to go out and vote, because that's ultimately
how we get stuff done.
Regardless if it's Republican, Democrat,
I just think that we need to vote.
People complain so much when stuff happens,
but they didn't vote, so it's, like,
you had no say in it anyway, 'cause you didn't do anything.
So, have your say and go out and vote.
♪ (punk rock outro) ♪