CNN anchor Anderson Cooper mocked Donald Trump’s recent habit of praising other men’s appearances by dubbing the president the “a**man-in-chief.”
Trump has drawn attention in recent weeks with a series of suggestive comments about Republican candidates and their physiques as he campaigns ahead of the midterm elections.
During his CNN program on Wednesday, Cooper poked fun at Trump’s latest unusual remarks about Ohio Senator Jon Husted, whose physique the president said he had been “studying.”
Cooper opened the segment with a clip from Seinfeld in which Kramer receives a license plate reading “A**MAN.” He then joked: “Big news tonight for Kramer… He is no longer New York’s most famous a**man.”
The anchor went on to call Trump a “derriere aficionado” in a pun-filled monologue, suggesting the president’s dismal 32 percent approval rating was “thanks to all his political junk in the trunk.”
Trump, Cooper joked, “is once again making sure voters know that, as far as he’s concerned, Ohio junior Senator Jon Husted is an unmitigated smoke show.”
After airing a clip in which Trump insisted that focusing on men’s looks had “never been my thing,” Cooper presented a montage of other occasions when the president had complimented men’s appearances.
“But – and I do emphasize but – the beauty of the male form is not exactly forbidden fruit for him,” Cooper said.
CNN anchor Anderson Cooper branded Donald Trump “the a**man-in-chief” while mocking the president’s recent fixation on praising men’s appearances
Trump has raised eyebrows with suggestive comments about Republican candidates and their physiques, including praising Ohio Senator Jon Husted for his “great a**” at two campaign events
During one of Trump’s extended compliments about Husted, the president told an Ohio rally last week that he had been impressed by the former college football player’s physique.
“I’m standing over here, and I don’t do this with men very often… I started examining his body because I didn’t know he was a great athlete,” Trump said.
“And I looked, and I watched up and down. I looked at his a** and I looked at the whole, and then I looked at his hands. Look at his hands. He’s got these, like, claws. And I got it. You are a great athlete.”
Trump returned to the subject on Tuesday during another speech about Husted’s appearance, this time at an event in North Carolina.
He told the audience that he had been “studying (Husted’s) body” and described it as being “like a piece of steel.”
“I looked at his a**, and then I looked at his legs. I said, ‘His a**, sh*t, it’s like, it’s like a pile of muscle,’” Trump said. “I tapped him on the shoulder, and it actually hurt my hand. He’s like a piece of steel. I said, ‘This guy’s a monster!’”
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Although Trump told the crowd that complimenting other men was “not my thing,” Cooper followed the remarks with a montage of other instances in which the president had praised men’s looks.
The montage included Trump describing Georgia GOP gubernatorial candidate Rick Jackson as a “very handsome, distinguished, beautiful-looking guy.”
He has also called Republican Senator Tim Sheehy a “handsome guy,” Kentucky Republican congressional nominee Ed Gallrein “beautiful,” and Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker a “good-looking sucker.”
The president points to Ohio Senator Jon Husted at a campaign rally on October 12
Trump has campaigned in recent weeks as Republicans brace for a potentially bruising result in the midterm elections
Cooper closed the segment with another jab, saying that while “Husted’s a** may be hard, his polling is soft,” noting that the senator was trailing by roughly five points in his race.
Trump has campaigned alongside Husted in an effort to improve the Republican’s polling as the White House faces a difficult outlook in the November 3 midterm elections.
With Trump at risk of losing control of Congress, the president received further bad news on Thursday when oil prices jumped after a report said the US and Israel planned to continue strikes on Iran following the elections.
Brent crude rose 2.68 percent to $111.74 a barrel on Thursday morning. The increase represents a major political problem for the president just 12 days before the November midterms, as he seeks to bring down prices at the pump.
Rising gas prices have pushed up the cost of living, leaving Republicans facing the possibility of losing both the House and Senate in less than two weeks.
Meanwhile, American and Israeli commanders have drawn up plans for a “short but intensive” operation targeting Iran’s nuclear facilities, energy infrastructure, and missile and drone arsenal, according to The New York Times.
Trump has even discussed using the 22,000-pound GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb—known as the “Mother of All Bombs”—against Pickaxe Mountain, a nuclear site buried deep beneath granite.
Officials privately say the president is partly attracted to the weapon because of its nickname.
Some US planners believe three days of intense bombardment could push Iran’s already weakened economy beyond the breaking point and compel Tehran to abandon its nuclear program after nearly eight months of war.
Trump pledged earlier this month that he would not launch an attack before the vote, while the full US armada—including three aircraft carriers and thousands of Marines—is expected to arrive in November.
