Anderson Cooper: Trump is ‘an obese turtle on its back flailing in the hot sun’
Cooper responded to Donald Trump's White House speech attacking the democratic process
CNN host Anderson Cooper went viral on social media after describing President Donald Trump as an “obese turtle on its back,” following Trump’s widely condemned press conference at the White House yesterday evening.
In an angry speech littered with lies, unsubstantiated claims, and innuendo, the president attacked the democratic process by declaring that he was being cheated out of his victory.
Trump railed against states where former Vice President Joe Biden was closing in on his narrow lead, demanding they stop counting votes, while simultaneously urging states where he trailed Biden to keep counting votes.
He accused Democrats, without evidence, of “trying to steal an election” and “trying to rig an election,” and said that there was “tremendous corruption” occurring — again without evidence.
Trump also falsely claimed he had won Wisconsin and Michigan, which were in fact won by Biden, as well as Georgia, where Biden leads as of press time, and Pennsylvania, which Biden is expected to win despite Trump currently holding a narrow lead.
He also attacked those counting votes in counties across the country, attacked the processes in place for counting and checking ballots, and said states should only count “legal” votes.
Trump’s speech was so brazenly dishonest that CNN dubbed it the “most dishonest speech of his presidency.”
The three largest broadcast networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC, cut away from the speech to fact check it, as did PBS and MSNBC.
CNN, which carried the speech in full, cut back to host Jake Tapper, who called it a “sad night for the United States of America to hear their president say that, to falsely accuse people of trying to steal the election, to try to attack democracy that way with his feast of falsehoods.”
“Lie after lie after lie about the election being stolen,” Tapper continued, adding. “It’s time for some Republican lawmakers to find their spine and talk to the president about what he needs to do for the good of the country.”
But it was Anderson Cooper, openly gay host of Anderson Cooper 360, who drew the biggest response on social media.
“I don’t think we’ve ever seen anything like this from a President of the United States and I think, as Jake [Tapper] said, it’s sad and it is truly pathetic,” Cooper said.
“And of course it is dangerous, and of course it will go to the courts, but you’ll notice that the president did not have any evidence presented at all, nothing,” he continued. “No actual, real evidence of any kind of fraud. He talked about people putting papers up in windows he talked about things he’d seen on the internet.”
Cooper then offered a colorful analogy for Trump’s desperate attempt to spread falsehoods and sow doubt about the validity of the election results.
“That is the President of the United States, that is the most powerful person in the world, and we see him like an obese turtle on his back, flailing in the hot sun, realizing his time is over, but he just hasn’t accepted it and he wants to take everybody down with him, including this country,” Cooper said.
Cooper’s comments have spawned memes, cartoons, and tweets from thousands of Twitter users, and footage of his comments have been viewed millions of times on the social network.
Watch the clip below:
Anderson Cooper: "That is the president of the United States. That is the most powerful person in the world. We see him like an obese turtle on his back flailing in the hot sun, realizing his time is over." pic.twitter.com/Az8Gp22wfJ
— andrew kaczynski🤔 (@KFILE) November 6, 2020
Biden currently leads in the race for the presidency as of press time, with 264 electoral votes to Trump’s 214, per the Associated Press.
Pennsylvania is widely expected to flip to Biden today, Nov. 6, which would give him more than the 270 votes required to become the President-elect.
Read more:
Sarah McBride on her historic state Senate win in Delaware
The 2020 Election: LGBTQ Candidates Win Big
Donald Trump’s anti-LGBTQ record exposed in devastating viral video
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