I'm here at beautiful...
I don't know where. Beats the hell out of me.
But my guest tonight is a New York Daily News columnist
and CNN contributor.
Her new show, S.E. Cupp Unfiltered,
premieres July 17 on HLN.
Please welcome S.E. Cupp.
-(cheers and applause) -Nice to see you. Nice to see you.
(mumbles) Yeah.
Yes.
(clearing her throat)
Now you're a Republican, and Jeb Bush
and Marco Rubio both criticized me this week.
Should more Republicans be standing up to me,
or should they shut up?
You know, I'd-I'd love it if more Republicans
and conservatives took a stand against the things
they believed in, not less than, you know, 200 days ago.
It's been pretty disappointing
to see how the party has unified,
not around their principles,
but around having an "R" in the White House.
Isn't that wonderful?
No. My name's "T." It's "T," not "R."
My mistake.
Well, do you think it's because
they care about maintaining control
in a party system that's so partisan
that it actually counteracts the ability for people to govern?
-Uh... -(laughter)
I think they're-they're certainly interested
in-in keeping control and keeping a majority.
The problem is, what have they really been able
to do with this majority?
Uh, not a whole lot.
You'd think that having nearly every lever of power
in Washington, you'd be able to get--
-I don't know-- health care passed. -We did.
You've only got seven years to work on it.
-Oh, we totally did it. We did it. -Yeah.
-Didn't you see? I went in the Rose Garden. -Uh-huh.
And I said my catchphrase, which I normally only say
on the television show--
"I'm the president. You can believe it?"
(laughter)
You wrote an article called "Our Endless Stream of Scandal."
Is that...?
Did you watch all of Scandal on Netflix and just lost your mind?
Yeah.
So, how do we parse all the messes that I'm involved in?
Yeah. Well, there's a lot,
and there's a lot of legitimate controversies and scandals
that we as a press and we as a public
and we as a legislature
should be looking at very seriously, and we are.
But there's also some distracting non-scandals,
like you swatting your wife's hand away on a foreign trip.
I was waving at her.
-Not a story. -I was waving at her, but really low.
Right.
I think when media outlets,
serious and credible media outlets,
uh, create an equivalency between that non-story
and real issues that are troubling,
it's no wonder why people hate the media
and feel like they can't trust us.
-Fake news. -Right.
Fake news. Isn't it true that that problem,
that generally people have at a level
that's almost underneath their consciousness,
of the fact that mainstream media, at this point,
is a scandal-to-scandal breaking-news collage,
has created a problem in which real stories get covered up
-by exactly what you're saying, this type of scandal... -Mm-hmm.
and then I can come in, label it fake news,
and rob us of a real dialogue
about the responsibilities of the fourth estate?
(applause, whooping)
Yeah, the fake news thing is a... is a problem,
and as a, you know, a member of the media,
I find that to be really, really unfair.
However, if you're a news consumer,
it's hard to tell the difference between "not news"
and "fake news."
And I'm concerned that when media outlets focus
on the "not news," then the news viewer
will have a very difficult time telling the difference.
You're a very likable conservative,
and I'm a very unlikable conservative.
Also not a conservative.
-Excuse me, I'm so conservative. -(laughs): I don't think so.
Well, you know, that's really great.
Why am I not a conservative?
Uh, I don't think you have
any undergirding conservative principles.
Oh, I've got undergirding, trust me.
Trust me.
Cinched tight.
Bad word choice.
You know, as you've said, you know,
you're not married to a political party,
this is how you got elected.
I think you wore the Republican party like a rented tuxedo
to get elected, and it... and it worked.
-Um, if... -Thank you.
It did, and I wish... I wish you'd be a little less insecure.
You won. Stop, you know, obsessing
about how, or who didn't vote for you.
Enough people liked you to make you president,
-so just do the job. -Whatever, man.
Three million people voted illegally,
and if Hillary hadn't won any of the votes,
I would've gotten all of them. You know that.
-Right. -That's the way it works.
-Right. -I have one last question.
What are three places where liberals and conservatives
can see eye to eye with each other,
if not agree, but at least work towards understanding?
Uh, today? Like, these liberals and conservatives?
-Yeah. -(laughs): Or... Geez.
It seems like, um...
it seems difficult, honestly, because we are so tribal
and we are so encamped in our...
in our, uh, political ideologies,
and... the idea that we can come together on causes
seems almost nostalgic.
And that's... that's very disappointing.
But I have faith that there are very good people
on both sides of the aisle-- I know some of them,
um, in the House and in the Senate--
who, uh... if they can emerge out of this morass,
uh, at some point, will be able to...
to work together on... on some of those...
those causes that used to unite both of our parties
-not that long ago. -I have an idea
of what's gonna unite both parties.
-Hmm? -My impeachment.
S.E. Cupp, everybody. S.E. Cupp.
-(cheering, applause) -S.E., stand up for a second.