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CNN Live Event/Special

CNN Saturday Morning Table for Five. Polls Show Decreasing Approval Rating for President Trump; Trump Administration Continues Firing Large Numbers of Federal Workers; President Trump Draws Criticism for Calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a Dictator; President Trump Recognizes Achievements of Black Americans at Event While His Administration Forbids Federal Departments from Recognizing Black History Month; Sports Analyst Stephen A. Smith Criticizes Ineffectiveness of Current Democratic Party; George Clooney Speaks Out about His Decision to Call on Joe Biden to Exit 2024 Presidential Race; Tensions Palpable between Team USA and Team Canada in NHL Hockey Game; White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller Touts President Trump's Renaming of Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America as Patriotic Act. Aired 10-11a ET

Aired February 22, 2025 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[10:00:21]

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, after a whirlwind of sharpies, MAGA, and Musk, the report card for Donald Trump's first month is in, and it's making America worried again.

Plus --

DONALD TRUMP, (R) U.S. PRESIDENT: A dictator without elections, Zelenskyy better move fast, or he's not going to have a country left.

PHILLIP: How a perceived insult is leading the president to upend history and leave an ally on the brink.

Also --

GEORGE CLOONEY, ACTOR: What am I supposed to do, storm the -- capitol?

PHILLIP: How the resistance may be giving up on persistence.

And an unexpected face off --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's get ready for an epic battle.

PHILLIP: -- puts a friendship on ice and sparks a debate over patriotism and power plays for the red, white, and blue.

Here in the studio, Bomani Jones, Alyssa Farah Griffin, Melik Abdul, and Harry Enten.

It's the weekend. Join the conversation at a "TABLE FOR FIVE".

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Good morning. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.

Let's get right to what America is talking about. What a year this month has been. Donald Trump has officially been in office for only 33 days, and his demolition of the government is more jarring than imagined or even promised. He's fired tens of thousands of workers at the behest of Elon Musk. He's killing off Biden's policies, anything related to diversity, and naming, renaming bodies of water. He's stiffing allies and siding with foes.

Some of these moves are small, admittedly, some are big, and some are just for trolling. Nevertheless, the wreckage is long. And while his approval rating is still higher than at any other time for him, there are other signs that he is more underwater than the Little Mermaid, as our friend Harry Enten puts it. For instance, the majority say that he is going too far with his power grabs. And most say that he is not doing enough to lower prices.

So the question this morning is, does a president with no real pushback, with no overwhelming guardrails, does he even care about public opinion, or will he continue to just go for broke with a larger sledgehammer? Or should we say a chainsaw?

Here at the table with our friends, Harry Enten. So tell us, this polling, I think, burst a little bit of the bubble from some numbers that we had gotten earlier in the Trump term. And it seems to indicate that, yes, there are some things Americans like, but a growing list of things they don't like.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICS WRITER AND ANALYST: Yes, I think that's, I think that's exactly right. I mean, look, Trump came in. He had a positive net approval rating. His approval rating was above his disapproval rating. And it made folks like me go, whoa, we never saw that during Trump's first term. And then all of a sudden this week, the numbers started coming in from a month in. And then what did we see? We saw Trump underwater in our CNN poll. We saw Trump underwater in the Quinnipiac University poll. We saw Trump underwater in the "Washington Post"-Ipsos poll, and so on, so forth.

So he's clearly underwater now. He's in a better position than he was, let's say, for most of his first term. But it's going in the wrong direction, and it's going in the wrong direction at the same time that folks are saying, this economy ain't so hot to trot. It's coming at a time in which his economic approval ratings stink far worse than during his first term. There are a lot of warning signs for Donald Trump in the numbers that came out.

PHILLIP: Yes, I mean, look, you could argue that everybody's numbers go down, right? Like no president goes up. They always go down.

However, what's striking to me, and the question that keeps turning over in my head is, does the man even care? He's supposedly not running, not running again, although he keeps joking about maybe he will, but do poll numbers even matter if your name is Donald Trump right now?

ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes and no. I think that he picks and chooses what information he chooses to believe. So as long as he can find some poll numbers that have him looking like he's doing really well.

But what he does care about is things like the stock market, and the Dow Jones closing low because of risks of tariffs and because of tariffs and some of his trade policies, that actually does resonate with him. When I worked with him, he'd always have FOX Business on in the outer Oval and just want to see every day how the markets closed. So if he feels like he's looking weak on the world stage, and if he feels like the economy is not moving quickly enough, that is something he will react to.

And I've said to my friends in Trump world, they should not take too much with this endorsement of the fact that he won and he won the popular vote, which was a surprise to some. He was very clearly elected on two things he's good at -- securing the border and, allegedly, addressing the economy. All of these other things are reminding people they might like the idea of Donald Trump better than Donald Trump himself.

MELIK ABDUL, MEMBER BLACK AMERICANS FOR TRUMP COALITION: And to piggyback off of that, and I was here a couple of weeks ago, and I bemoaned that there was so much focus on DEI.

[10:05:05]

and I said that Americans were concerned about the economy. And we're seeing now, because I saw your report on yesterday, that's where Donald Trump is failing most, when it -- well, not failing. But that's where the issue is with Donald Trump regarding the economy. People are, there's not a lot of pushback that you see around the immigration policy. We see that about 93 border engagements are about, maybe about 93 percent are ICE arrests, or doubled now what they were. Donald Trump has done some things around IVF treatment. I think that that's a very good thing. It's an extension of what Donald Trump did when he was in office, where it was through the Veterans Administration, the Veterans Health Administration, they were focusing on providing IVF treatment to veterans and their families. So those types of things are important.

But I think what you said, and in addition to the economy, it is how people feel. And are you being reminded about that -- are you being reminded about the things you don't necessarily like about Donald Trump? Economic anxiety is the thing that the Trump campaign ran on, and I think that he won on. Well, that economic anxiety still exists. And I know because $8.99 was the costs of eggs.

BOMANI JONES, HOST, "THE RIGHT TIME WITH BOMANI JONES," PODCAST: Oh, I got hit with I got hit with the $8.50 yesterday.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: Not to one-up you, but I paid like $9.99 today.

JONES: Across the street from my house.

PHILLIP: But the point is, where is the focus on the bird flu and the eggs prices?

JONES: But I am fascinated by you saying that he is joking about running again.

PHILLIP: I'm saying he claims that --

JONES: He claims --

PHILLIP: I don't know if it's true.

JONES: Look, here's the -- was it the White House Twitter account that put out the thing that called him the king?

PHILLIP: Right.

JONES: What, the convention this weekend with all these people talking about the idea of him running again. These ain't no joke. Like, deep down inside, this is serious. And the reason this terrifies me is there is no joke. You're not supposed -- you can't run again if you're in his position. So if the joke is that you're running again, there is not going to be an election if this is going to be the thing that you are going to do.

So when we start talking about his polling numbers, I'm fascinated by that because it is almost as though we are treating him like a president who could run again. Now that could be deleterious to the party itself if he has terrible numbers, and then you get to a midterm election and everybody goes down. But for him, at least in theory, the polling doesn't matter. That's the beauty of being a second term president. That's the complaint about Obama's second term was, what did you have to lose this time? You could have done a whole bunch of other stuff.

So when we start talking about him in the context of polling numbers, I feel like we're looking at him in a way that legitimizes the potential for what could really happen, which is there might not be a 2028 election, at least the way that these people are behaving as though that is not in their plan.

PHILLIP: I mean, who knows?

JONES: But the fact that were even saying who knows is wild.

PHILLIP: There are all kinds of other scenarios that could happen. I'm not even going to go into it. But, Harry, you were --

ENTEN: No, I think I think there are two things going on. Number one, you know, if you look at the betting markets, I occasionally look at them, who's going to be the Republican nominee come 2028. You know, Donald Trump isn't a zero.

PHILLIP: Is that what they're saying.

ENTEN: There are a few folks who are betting on, I think it was like, you know, trading at like seven percent or something along those lines. It's not the craziest thing we might have ever heard.

But I'll also say this. We talk about why Donald Trump was elected in that first place, right? He was elected, immigration, where folks actually like what he's doing on immigration. And he was elected to fix the economy where people really don't like what he's doing at this particular point. What he was not necessarily elected to do was put Elon Musk in the position that he is in with DOGE. And if you ask voters, what is the number one thing you dislike about what Donald Trump has done so far in his second term, it's that dismantling of the federal agencies. It's the firing of those folks and it's putting Elon Musk in that position that he is right now. And it's so far blowing up in his face, at least when it comes to the public opinion poll.

PHILLIP: Let me play from this really blow up of a town hall that Congressman Rich McCormick got in Georgia, kind of rural part of the state. Just listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tyranny is rising in the White House, and a man has declared himself our king. So I would like to know, rather, the people would like to know what you, Congressman, and your fellow congressmen, are going to do to rein in the megalomaniac in the White House?

(CHEERING)

REP. RICH MCCORMICK, (R-GA): When you talk about tyranny, when you talk about presidential power, I remember having the same discussion with Republicans when Biden was elected.

(BOOS)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: I stand corrected, more suburban districts, but a pretty safe seat for him. And it was like that for the whole town hall. It was not pretty.

JONES: I think one thing that gets lost about the federal government is that it is the number one employer in the United States. and no matter what people think about government employees not working hard enough, you don't have this job security, whatever it is, once you start having mass layoffs at the number one employer in America, that is going to not just affect the people you're talking to, the people related to the people that you're talking to, all the way around. That is, I think that seemed like a better play in their minds than it's turning out to be an application, especially since it doesn't appear to make any sense.

[10:10:02]

PHILLIP: Based on polls that maybe angry constituents, maybe Congress people freaking out, maybe Jesse Watters freaking out, I don't know. Do we have time to play Jesse Watters? Let's play it real quick.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JESSE WATTERS, FOX NEWS HOST: He just found out he's probably going to get laid off. He's going to get DOGE-ed. This guy is not a DEI consultant. This guy is not a climate consultant. You know, this guy is a veteran.

We just need to be a little bit less callous with the way, Harold, we talk about DOGE-ing people.

Thousands of bureaucrats woke up today to a big "you're fired." DOGE is dishing out spankings like daddy daycare.

Even the holiday weekend couldn't slow DOGE down. There was a huge exodus over at the national archives. Persnickety librarians were getting DOGE-ed silly. The Dewey Decimal System is next.

DOGE is a blessing from the heavens above.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Well, somebody woke up and discovered that the federal government employs a lot of veterans.

ABDUL: It seems like that Jesse Waters agrees with me that Republicans should stop demonizing federal workers to. To his point, I know a guy down in Alabama, first time getting a government job. He had, you know, fresh out of college, had been trying to get a job for a couple of years now. Finally got that government job, I think, about six months ago. Well, he's laid off now. So his kid, his wife, all of that promise, it's totally gone.

And I think your point is right. Once people start seeing -- because when we think of federal government, for many anti-government people, they think DMV, meaning D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. They don't see federal government as someone working, living in a rural area of Mississippi, commuting to a job at the Department of Agriculture. They don't see them as federal workers, which is why it's always easy to just say, shut them down. They'll get paid. That's not how it works.

PHILLIP: And we will find out a lot more stories like that in the coming weeks.

Coming up next for us, though, the president continues to attack Ukraine and Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the same time, while also taking Russia's side. It is a stunning shift in American policy.

Plus, Trump marks Black History Month while his administration literally erases it from the government. We'll discuss.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [10:17:06]

PHILLIP: Welcome back. Here are some facts for you. Russia invaded Ukraine. Vladimir Putin is the invader. Putin started the war. Ukraine did not. But if you asked the president of the United States, he answers like he's inside the Kremlin.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) U.S. PRESIDENT: A dictator without elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he's not going to have a country left. Got to move, got to move fast because that war is going in the wrong direction.

In the meantime, we're successfully negotiating an end to the war with Russia, something all admit that only Trump is going to be able to do, and the Trump administration. We're going to be able to do it. I think Putin even admitted that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: This week marks an absolutely stunning shift in American foreign policy, one that's been in place since World War II. Now, historically, the United States works with allies to defend democracy and rebukes autocrats and illegal takeovers of other countries. But instead, Trump is now signaling that Ukraine may soon be on its way -- on its own when it comes to its survival, and that the United States is now taking Russia's side in that conflict. The shift is also getting bipartisan, and that backlash is coming even from his loyalists.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK LEVIN, HOST, "THE MARK LEVIN SHOW": I don't know why there are people that not only oppose Zelenskyy, but seem to support Putin.

SEN. LISA MURKOWSKI, (R-AK): I certainly would not call President Zelenskyy a dictator.

KENNEDY, HOST, "KENNEDY SAVES THE WORLD": I think Vladimir Putin started the war.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This man is a cancer and the greatest threat to democracy in my lifetime.

SEN. JOHN THUNE, (R-SD) SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: The president speaks for himself.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: I can't imagine why, Mark Levin can't imagine why Trump would take Putin's side. It's not actually the first time. I remember in Helsinki he stood next to Putin and said, the United States intelligence community is lying.

GRIFFIN: Well, he also, Donald Trump telegraphed his position on Ukraine throughout the election. This was one of the reasons Nikki Haley strongly opposed him in the primary, and why lifelong Republican voters like myself wanted to see someone like her rather than Donald Trump. He has a profound lack of moral clarity when it comes to the issue of Russia and Ukraine.

And in the first term, he had advisers around him who gave him real information. He had people like Mike Pompeo, Mike Pence, who gave him the facts. And even so, he often sided with Putin. But now I think he's actually living in an information bubble where he doesn't know the reality of things. He actually is buying into what's likely Russian propaganda, that Zelenskyy is a thug, that he is using the money America gives him to benefit himself and not to execute the war. I think it's profoundly scary, and I hope this is the moment Republican senators maybe find some courage.

PHILLIP: It's not going to help that perhaps one of the most vociferous opponents of Ukraine and Zelenskyy is in the White House, the vice president, J.D. Vance, has been like this for a while now. And that's where a lot of this is coming from. I mean, I think you're right that it's misinformation and it's Russian propaganda, but it's also a philosophy that is endorsed by his vice president.

[10:20:00]

ABDUL: So I don't think that I don't think we're looking at an issue of Russian propaganda here. Go back to 2022, Joe Biden at the State of the Union, when the Ukrainian ambassador was there, said, we're in this for as long as it takes. In February of 2024, the United States announced about 500 additional sanctions on Russia.

This issue, Ukraine, was an issue during the campaign where people were saying about the amount of money that were investing, I think it's now about $67 billion that were investing in Ukraine, and no one out there says that Ukraine can win. We've had conversations about putting Ukraine in a better position. That was the whole point of sending in the ATACMS. But they're not in a better negotiating position.

I think what Donald Trump is doing right here is that he is at least having a conversation with the party who needs to be at the table if you're talking about any type of negotiations. I get the world wants to shut out Putin, Europe wants to shut out Putin. But you need to be able to talk to him. And so for me, I'm happy that Donald Trump is at least having the conversation with Putin. We don't know what's going to come out --

PHILLIP: But he's not having the conversation with Ukraine --

GRIFFIN: If I could just say, though. This notion that I think is often pushed on the right, that there's some sort of blank check is sent to Ukraine, it is the American industrial base that were creating weapons, that are creating jobs, that are benefiting our economy, that we are then sending to Ukraine to fight off one of our chief adversaries. I would say the work itself Ukraine is doing for us already. So the notion that were now shaking them down for rare earth minerals to pay us back feels un-American, to put it bluntly. ENTEN: I think there are two things going on here. Look, I don't

think there are many Americans who are big fans of Vladimir Putin. I mean, his favorable rating, you know, is about the same as the percentage of Americans who think that we faked the moon landing. I think it's south of 10 percent. But at the same time, look, I think Donald Trump is speaking for a lot of Americans who feel that we've gone too far in our support of Ukraine. I mean, I can remember back --

PHILLIP: We have the numbers.

ENTEN: We have the numbers.

PHILLIP: Seven percent in 2022 said U.S. support for Ukraine is too much. Now it's 41 percent. But that's still basically a majority that supports providing aid. But it's just that the numbers --

ENTEN: The numbers, the opposition has risen. Instead of it being, this little minority in a corner, now it's a significant minority. And more than that, it's a majority of Republicans who feel that support for Ukraine has gone too far. So I think you have to almost walk this tightrope whereby you don't say I love Putin, but at the same time saying, you know what, maybe we can take our foot off the pedal. I'm not sure Donald Trump is walking that tightrope.

PHILLIP: I don't think the tightrope is being walked.

JONES: But I do think it's an interesting point that when you ask this in 2022, people don't have a time horizon in mind of how long this is going to go. Like, I think there are some people who are less informed who will look up and be like, wait, we're still doing that? Like I thought, you know, I thought this thing was going to be a wrap sooner.

But I thought that you made a very important point, or at least a distinction to have between this term of Trump and the previous term of Trump, which is this one, at least theoretically and by hypothesis, has a lot fewer reasonable people surrounding him, because there are a lot fewer reasonable people who, after seeing the first four years, would dare to sign up for this again. So who are the people that talk to him? Who are the people that advise him? And who among them are going to say something that he doesn't like to hear? Because if you learned anything from the first four years, you know what the penalties are for doing that. So all you're going to have is a bunch of people who are like, yes, man. Either, hey, man, do whatever you want, or people that he listens to, and they think they can tell him anything.

PHILLIP: Yes. And I think also, I mean, we played the sound of lawmakers criticizing Putin, but they're also giving Trump a lot of rope on this issue, at least for now. So we'll see where that goes.

Coming up next for us, his White House is taking an ax to everything involving diversity and DEI. He's even refusing to acknowledge Black History Month. So why, then, did the president host a Black History Month event at the White House? We'll discuss.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:28:10]

PHILLIP: Erase black history, unless, of course, you can get Tiger Woods to show up. In one month, the Trump administration has done basically everything to turn diversity and DEI into curse words. And the soon to be education secretary even questioned whether black history will be allowed to be continued, taught -- to be taught in American schools. Now agencies have completely erased identity months -- yes, that includes Black History Month -- from what they are allowed to do. In fact, Trump's transportation secretary, he called them a distraction.

So it's kind of awkward when Trump then turns around and holds a Black History Month event at the White House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) U.S. PRESIDENT: We pay tribute to the generations of black legends, champions, warriors, and patriots who helped drive our country forward to greatness. And you really are great, great people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Well, we -- where do I even begin? I mean, we've been here for the last 33 days, so we've seen this all happen. But just today, or this week, the Trump administration also suspended an Agriculture Department scholarship program for historically black colleges. It is still, last I checked, Black History Month. And that's the stuff that's actually happening, putting aside the pictures and the smiles and the Tiger Woods.

ABDUL: So I don't think that the Trump administration, they're not trying to cancel black history. They are trying to focus on DEI programs. They did -- I was happy that he had the event at the White House. People don't realize this is an annual event at the White House. Presidents, Republican and Democrats, have put these events on each year. There were questions about how -- whether or not Donald Trump would do it, considering what people like Pete Hegseth said, well, we're not going to acknowledge this at the Department of Defense.

Now, to be clear, I didn't get an invite to -- I didn't get an invite.

PHILLIP: Which is a whole other story.

ABDUL: Yes, which is a whole other story.

[10:30:01]

PHILLIP: But you just said it. I mean, Pete Hegseth said, you cannot acknowledge Black History Month at the Defense Department. The Department of Transportation said you cannot acknowledge Black History Month.

ABDUL: But the president --

PHILLIP: I don't understand -- I don't understand how you can say that, and they can declare that those history month recognitions in their departments are basically verboten, and then all of a sudden Trump is like --

ABDUL: I think it's Trump sending two different signals. So I think that there is a signal to the anti DEI, what I call the woke right. Yes, the woke right, that is a thing. Those people, anti DEI. But for many other people around Donald Trump who don't have a problem with things like Black History Month, I think that that was an important thing. But I thought that this is a good thing because it shows that Donald Trump is at least listening.

JONES: But let's give like the headsets and those people the benefit of the doubt on this one. And let's operate under this assumption, that you may think that Black History Month is OK, but you are terrified of being the person that says it's OK, because everything that you're hearing implies that it's not OK. So you're going to play it safe and be like, sorry, we're not doing Black History Month over here. I think that is that is an argument a lot of those people could ultimately make.

I think Trump becomes interesting because he reminds me of a lot of people that I met at various points, where I am not sure how much he likes black people, but he does like the idea or thought that black people like him. He really -- he gets off on that notion and that idea. So he can get Tiger Woods and Kodak Black in the same room to tell him how dope he is. He loves that. His ego absolutely loves that. And so when I saw that, I was like, oh, OK, I think I see what's going on here.

And also his belief is that he could get more of our votes in all of these things. So that's not something that's wise for him to turn off, is the Black History Month thing. The stuff of the offices is one thing. The stuff he can put on television, it makes all the sense in the world for him to do this as he has.

ENTEN: Well, I was just going to say, I mean, in the 2024 election, he got a higher percentage of the black vote than any Republican since Gerald Ford in 76. You look at his approval rating right now, it's high teens, low 20s among black voters. You may say, well, that's low, but it's actually significantly higher than it was in term number one for him.

And more than that, look at the long-term trends in terms of party identification. You look at the chart from Gallup, the Democrats percentage of blacks identifying as Democrats, going down. So, you know, we say all this stuff about DEI, and, yes, it splits the country right down the middle. But the bottom line is more black voters are becoming Republican now than they were five, ten years ago.

PHILLIP: And I think that that makes sense because, you know, for black people, not everybody thinks that their racial identity is the most important thing to them. That's a fact. But at the same time, this whole anti-DEI thing actually has real policy consequences. These scholarships are going to real black people, and now they're suspended. And they're -- I mean, you name it, all kinds of other policies that are directly affecting black people.

GRIFFIN: Not to sound like the old person with their cane like, well, back in the first Trump administration. But he was proud when he signed an extension of funding for HBCUs, for example. He stood up a White House office that was basically looking at opportunity zones and investment in the black community. Whether you like the policies or not is a different discussion, but it was something he was front and center with. It was something he did talk about on the campaign trail, and I think is why his numbers went up specifically with black and brown men.

But then he does things that seem overreaching. I've got issues. I think a lot of DEI has gone too far. I think a lot of Americans feel that way. But to just wholesale across the board say we're getting rid of it and then pressuring private companies and corporations to do so, I also think is a massive overstep the other direction. He's going to end up undermining his own gains.

PHILLIP: I really do wonder about the fate of HBCUs in this kind of political environment, because the rhetoric on the right is, I think, very much headed in the direction of, why are HBCUs around? I don't think they understand it. And I'm not sure that, frankly, I'm not sure Trump does.

JONES: The smaller ones in particular.

PHILLIP: Yes, the smaller ones.

JONES: And there are a lot of itty-bitty HBCUs that people do not know exist. The more the ones that are in peril. Yes, I mean, people know about three of them generally.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: Coming up next for us, George Clooney speaks out about his decision to call on Joe Biden to exit the race and issue some blame in that conversation.

Plus, the loudest voice in sports suggesting that he is the candidate for 2028. And we're not talking about Bomani Jones.

(LAUGHTER)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:38:55]

PHILLIP: Love him or hate him, Donald Trump is everywhere. He is at the racetrack, at the Super Bowl, in suites, on magazine covers, on front pages. And very soon he will be calling the shots on Americas art at the Kennedy Center.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE BANNON, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE CHIEF STRATEGIST: I think the J-6 choir is going to play the Kennedy Center.

(APPLAUSE)

BANNON: For a night in honor of their families.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Trump is permeating the culture, whether you like it or not. The question is now, where are the Democrats? Well, they are getting lectured by a sports host.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN A. SMITH, ESPN HOST: I believe it is an utter embarrassment to the Democratic Party that I am a candidate in people's eyes for the presidency of the United States. It's an indictment against them, and they need to get their act together before somebody like me or somebody else takes it real seriously and says, to hell with you all, because the roster that I'm seeing right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: But why not Stephen A.?

(LAUGHTER)

JONES: Why did you got go to me first?

PHILLIP: Because.

JONES: I mean the why not is, I mean, where's the why?

(LAUGHTER)

JONES:

[10:40:04]

I think I think the why, to be fair to him and everybody else, at this point, if I'm Stephen A. Smith and I look around, why not me does seem like a fair question. But that is an indictment of not the Democrats. That is an indictment of everything much broader. But bless the hearts of anybody that tries to get on television and argue with that man about anything. I'm telling you right now, you are probably going to lose. I might not lose. You're going to lose.

PHILLIP: He's right, though, that nobody in the country right now seems to like the Democrats. They are having a hard time, Harry.

ENTEN: No, I mean, look, Quinnipiac had a poll out this week asking about the approval rating, the favorability rating of congressional Democrats. And what was the number in the poll? I think we have it up. I think it was, what --

PHILLIP: Twenty percent overall don't like the Democrats, 40 percent of Democrats don't like the Democrats. ENTEN: More Democrats dislike congressional Democrats than like them.

I mean, what are we even talking about here? For all of the problems that Donald Trump may have one month into his presidency, congressional Democrats and the Democratic Party are on their own island so far from the American public, you'd have to take a -- you'd have to fly into a one island and then fly to another island. That's how far away they are from the American public at this particular point. Democrats are in the desert. I'm not even sure my forefathers could cross it.

PHILLIP: I don'ts ee -- I mean, honestly, I have seen nothing, absolutely nothing in the last month. I mean, maybe three months since the election --

GRIFFIN: That "We Will Win" chant didn't do it for you?

PHILLIP: I don't -- but really, like, every time people ask, what's the plan? I get like a five-page memo, and it's like, what does this memo say? And it doesn't really say.

GRIFFIN: Well, and listen, the DCNC chair elections I don't think gave anyone hope who is rooting for the Democrats. It became more and more doubling down on identity boxes, making sure that there's all this representation, but not an actual strategy, cohesive message, and a leader of the Democratic Party. There is no leader of the Democratic Party.

ABDUL: And it reminds me of what happened during the campaign, because Democrats were convinced is that if we could say that Donald Trump is racist enough, that will get people to vote against Donald Trump. And it didn't work. And so now we have Representative Crockett, she's on "The Breakfast Club" talking about that she is, she's for Canada and Mexico. You have them screaming expletives outside of federal buildings --

GRIFFIN: Or calling Trump voters uneducated, which is not helpful.

ABDUL: It's not going to work.

PHILLIP: I just want to just mention this, because we were talking about George Clooney. But this is why we're talking about George Clooney. He said in an interview with Maureen Dowd that "Biden abdicated his responsibility by hiding his incapacities, Clooney told -- Clooney told me, and the media in many ways dropped the ball." So it's the media's fault.

JONES: I don't think he's so wrong.

GRIFFIN: I, actually, I'm with you on.

GRIFFIN: That right there, that debate was staggering for people. And for that moment to come in America all at one time be like, yo, what's up with your man? You're not going to tell me that more --

PHILLIP: Didn't George Clooney host a fundraiser for Joe Biden?

JONES: Yes.

PHILLIP: Why didn't George Clooney say something.

JONES: He did.

PHILLIP: Before, before the debate.

JONES: But the crazy part is that Maureen Dowd is talking to George Clooney about this, and he's the person to be making the statement because they don't have anybody to talk --

GRIFFIN: I have never been bullied more in anyplace I've been in public life than when I said, it's time that this guy step aside, despite glaring polls --

PHILLIP: Bullied like on television?

GRIFFIN: On the left, on the right, it was -- I mean, it is -- the media could have been harder on it. I'm just going to be honest. Like it was a conversation that you just couldn't have.

ENTEN: The media, yes. But what about congressional Democrats? What about the Democratic Party?

GRIFFIN: Well, that's true.

ENTEN: Why did they not get Joe Biden out? Oh, no, he's doing great. He's amazing. He's doing somersaults. What's going on?

ABDUL: Because they thought he was the only person who could win that election.

GRIFFIN: But can they read polls? Because that's what -- I mean, they would have gotten defeated even more seriously than they did had they kept --

PHILLIP: This is why all roads lead back to Stephen A. because --

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: -- at the end of the day, I mean, they have to make amends for putting someone in that position and find somebody who can actually bring people to the table.

JONES: To me, the biggest issue in the United States is very simple. Corporate profits bigger than ever. Wage growth stagnating year after year after year after year after year.

Now, if the party is not willing to distinguish itself as the one to say that the corporations are the ones that are holding you back, which they're not going to do because the money in politics is so different now than it was 20, 30 years ago, then how do you distinguish yourself from this other party?

PHILLIP: Coming up next, it's one of the biggest cultural moments of the week. USA versus Canada facing off in hockey. But the matchup sparked some patriotic war of words.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:49:16]

PHILLIP: An unexpected moment in culture this week became an international incident. For the first time, the NHL turned its all- star celebration into a face-off between nations, with players divided by their homelands. The rivalries sparked fights and National Anthem antics, and people sharing clips from "Miracle on Ice" and "The Mighty Ducks." Most notably, it got the attention of politicians at a time of real tension, though, between the United States and Canada. President Trump called the team and the White House used the game to push his expansion fantasy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does President Trump have a bet with Trudeau about this USA-Canada hockey game tonight?

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: He looks forward to watching the game tonight, and we look forward to the United States beating our soon to be 51st state, Canada.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(LAUGHTER)

[10:50:06]

When Canada won, Justin Trudeau trolled his counterparts push to make the prime minister into an American governor. I'm not kidding. This is -- this is real life. Yes, Bomani, you seem surprised. I'm not sure why you're so surprised.

JONES: It's not that I'm surprised. It's just the point I don't feel like anybody brings up with this 51st state thing, that's the second largest country in the world by area that has 40 million people. We're going to make it a state?

ABDUL: Who do you think they're going to vote for?

JONES: Well, see, that is that is the ironic rub is like they're conservatives are way more liberal than ours.

PHILLIP: And some of them speak French. Wait until they find that out.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: I don't, I don't think they're going to like that very much.

GRIFFIN: The Trump White House does love trolling. They're clearly leaning into that even more in this second term. But this one, I mean, it's again, sometimes his antics being counterproductive. Justin Trudeau's party has been at an all-time low. Obviously, he had to resign. And now their numbers are actually going back up because of these threats of the U.S. conquering Canada and so on. And just a reminder, like this is a NATO ally who has come to our aid in every major event. During the L.A. wildfires, they came after --

ABDUL: Our trading partner.

GRIFFIN: They're one of our biggest -- yes.

PHILLIP: Yes. OK, so I mean, the other part of this is like patriotism. Is this what it's all about? You want to acquire another country? And according to Stephen Miller, this is the other part of what it means to be American these days.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN MILLER, WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF: Of course, as you all know, he has renamed the Gulf of Mexico to its correct and proper name, the Gulf of America. He is renamed Mount Denali into Mount McKinley, part of a historic effort to restore patriotism and national pride all across this land.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: OK, Mount McKinley, Mount Denali. But nobody calls it the gulf of America, OK?

ENTEN: He does.

PHILLIP: Except for him.

ABDUL: And in the White House, they say --

PHILLIP: For 400 years it's been Gulf of Mexico.

ABDUL: I don't think that people care about the naming Gulf of Mexico versus Gulf of America. But I do think that this push, you know, this what we saw from Karoline Leavitt, you know, the 51st state and all of those types of things. Yes, it's trolling, and this is where they break. But it's one thing for Donald Trump to do it. It's another thing for the people around Donald Trump to do it. And when Stephen Miller, you know, Stephen Miller has been around for a while, so many of us are accustomed to Stephen Miller. But I think he would have been better off pushing an America first argument than this is a gauge for patriotism. You don't have to use it as a gauge of patriotism.

ENTEN: I was just going to say, among the things that Donald Trump has done in his first month, of the things that poll the lowest, one of them is renaming the Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America, which was surprising to me a little bit. Because we don't --

PHILLIP: It's not surprising to me.

ENTEN: We don't like it. We don't want it.

PHILLIP: Americans are not dumb. Like, they understand that this doesn't, A, matter. And, B, why pick a fight over it? GRIFFIN: I weirdly don't really hate this. I actually see it as a

more inclusive term. It's North and South and Central America. Like is it unnecessary? Yes. Is it just like a pounding your chest, kind of pro America thing? But to me, it's sort of like it almost becomes a distraction where like some of what he's doing is should warrant a little more --

JONES: The issue is who sat up and was like, you know what we need to do, right? It's a to me, it is a signal of everything else. And then somebody sat up and said --

GRIFFIN: And then the television production of flying over as he signs the executive order.

PHILLIP: I mean, coming up next for us, the panel will give us their unpopular opinions, what they're not afraid to say out loud.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:58:10]

PHILLIP: We're back, and it's time for your unpopular opinions. You each have 30 seconds to tell us yours. Alyssa, you're up.

GRIFFIN: So Vice President J.D. Vance has been getting some backlash for basically just tweeting, stream of thoughts, clapping back at journalists, tweeting out foreign policy. And while I hate almost everything that he's tweeting, I don't hate the strategy. I think that this White House is very well adapted to the media environment that we live in. And rather than writing an op-ed as a vice president that would take weeks to go through clearances, he is responding in real time and driving news cycles on his own terms. So I think it's actually quite savvy and smart, and Democrats could learn something from it.

PHILLIP: It's 2025 people.

JONES: For the first time in 49 years, members of the New York Yankees will be allowed to wear beards. They have changed the facial hair policy that prohibited them from having hair outside, I think it was the outer lip. And they should have kept it. I understand it is 2025, but that that made them different. That was part of the brand of what they are. And now in this day and age, you could be the renegades by being the opposite of the renegades and going against the trend. That's how you stand out. They should have kept it. Somebody needs to be old and stodgy.

PHILLIP: This is surprising.

JONES: Somebody needs to still be old and stodgy.

PHILLIP: Something surprising coming from the guy with a beard.

ENTEN: Bomani and I are on the same page. It was I was going to go right for the Yankee beards, so I don't have to explain the situation. I guess my unpopular opinion with this is I don't care whether or not they have beards or not, they're still terrible.

(LAUGHTER)

ENTEN: They are trash. I wish them nothing but 14 inning games played in rain. They haven't won a World Series since 2009. It's absolutely wonderful. I only wish it happened when I was in high school so all those Bronx kids didn't make fun of me.

PHILLIP: You guys are rough.

(LAUGHTER)

ABDUL: I know this is as blasphemous as saying that tony seasoning and old bay seasoning doesn't go on every piece of food, but I've walked the streets of New York City, and I have yet to have a good slice of New York pizza.

GRIFFIN: Oh, my goodness. John's of Bleecker Street, I love it.

PHILLIP: You know what, I believe it. I think you have to look for a good slice in the city. It's not just hanging around on the sidewalks.

JONES: Where you live at?

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: All right, everybody, thank you very much. And thank you for watching "TABLE FOR FIVE". You can catch me every weeknight, 10:00 p.m. eastern, with our "NEWS NIGHT" roundtable. But in the meantime, CNN's coverage continues right now.