Seth Meyers ties Donald Trump to white nationalist groups

Seth Meyers took a “closer look” at Donald Trump’s support from white supremacists on Tuesday’s episode of Late Night. The host began by noting that a white nationalist group has begun robo-calling registered Iowan voters to urge them to vote for the businessman in the Republican primary, which Meyers cited as “yet another example of the degree to which Trump’s candidacy has appealed to racists.”

“Now, if you’ve been following the news lately, you know it’s an incredibly hard time for white people,” said Meyers. “Everything has gluten; Mad Men ended; and there are seven-year-old children in this country who have never even known a white president.”

However, the Late Night host assured viewers that there is “hope for this neglected underclass in the candidacy of Donald Trump” thanks to support from such groups as the American Renaissance – a name that Meyers compared to an in-flight magazine – which is a white nationalist Super PAC that began making the aforementioned calls this week in support of the billionaire. The recorded message urges Iowans to vote for Trump because he’s the only candidate who will only allow “smart, well-educated white people” into the country, and not Muslims.

“So basically, give me your tired, your poor, your huddled Canadians?” asked Meyers.

The comedian also mocked the group’s founder, Jared Taylor, who complained in an interview that he and other ordinary white folks are “sick of having to press 1 for Spanish.”

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“Wait, have you been pressing 1 for Spanish this whole time, because it’s almost always press 1 for English, and press 2 for Spanish,” said Meyers. “That certainly would explain why you’re so angry. Lo siento mucho.”

Meyers admitted that Trump has no official affiliation with the group, but noted that another white supremacist, former KKK leader David Duke, also publicly supports Trump, though he called some of what he has to say a little extreme. “I don’t agree with everything he says, he speaks… a lot more radically than I talk,” Duke was quoted as saying last year.

“That’s David Duke basically saying, ‘Me, I’m KKK. Trump’s like KKKKK,'” joked Meyers.

The show then ran clips of Trump talking about expelling bad immigrants from the country in response to his and his supporter’s claim that his campaign has done nothing to inspire white supremacists. Meyers then suggested that perhaps the presidential candidate isn’t the best person to judge who is a really good person as evidenced by his actions at a campaign rally last week in Vermont where he made security eject a protester out into the freezing cold weather without allowing him to get his coat back.

However, he also noted that the GOP front-runner isn’t the only politician to make racist comments, spotlighting Maine Gov. Paul LePage’s recent controversial and racially charged remarks that he made in response to his state’s growing heroin epidemic.

“Clearly there’s something about Trump’s rhetoric that appeals to racial resentment and division, but this is an important point: It’s not just Trump,” Meyers continued. “The Republican Party’s race problem extends well beyond him.”

Last week, when discussing drug traffickers in his state, LePage was quoted as saying “these are guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty – these types of guys – they come from Connecticut and New York, they come up here, they sell their heroin, they go back home… Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave, which is a real sad thing because then we have another issue we have to deal with down the road.”

“D-Money, Smoothie and Shifty. Are they from New York or the ’90s?” asked Meyers. “I mean it does make sense. There’s nothing white girls love more than smoothies.”

The Late Night host then lampooned LePage’s half-hearted apology and explanation for his comments. Watch the entire segment below.

Next: Samuel L. Jackson talks Donald Trump feud with Seth Meyers

NBC has just announced that the network has renewed Meyers’ contract until February 2021, while also revealing that he will host a special New Year’s Eve edition of the show at the end of the year. Late Night continues weeknights on NBC.

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