Brow Beat

Stephen Colbert Cringes at the Most Awkward Moment of Trump’s Already Extremely Awkward North Dakota Speech

“Donald Trump did more things today,” announced Stephen Colbert wearily at the beginning of Wednesday night’s monologue on The Late Show. One of those things Trump did was make a very painful-to-watch speech in North Dakota, in which Trump voiced his surprise that the state could possibly suffer a drought and assured North Dakotans they were “better off” than Texans devastated by Hurricane Harvey. “I’m gonna guess that one was off-script,” quipped Colbert.

And yet, amazingly, Trump managed to make a weird speech even weirder while talking about his daughter, Ivanka, who was in attendance. His comments, via the Washington Post:

“Sometimes they’ll say: You know, he can’t be that bad of a guy, look at Ivanka,” Trump said. “Come on up, honey. She’s so good. She wanted to make the trip. She said: ‘Dad, can I go with you?’ She actually said: ‘Daddy, can I go with you?’ I like that, right? ‘Daddy, can I go with you?’’

If you’re somehow not already creeped out by the dynamic between Trump and his oldest daughter, it’s going to be difficult to explain why you should be. (Maybe you should just watch this?) Suffice it to say that in this context, the squick factor comes from a combination of Trump’s preference for being called “Daddy” and his jokes on more than one occasion about how he’d date Ivanka if the two weren’t related.

“Not weird at all,” Colbert said sarcastically of Trump’s comments. “All of Trump’s advisors call him daddy—I think Sean Spicer was actually the one who started it.’’