employee of the week. good night. captioning sponsored by comedy central >> trevor: from comedy central's world news headquarters in new york, this is "the daily show" with trevor noah. (cheers and applause) welcome to "the daily show." i'm trevor noah. thank you so much for tuning in. our guest tonight, journalist and outspoken critic of vladimir putin, masha guessen is here, everybody. going to be a really great conversation. but this is a moment of joy. let's get right to the trump administration. because these guys do not take a day off. the new communications director anthony scaramucci hasn't even before here a week and already he has his own scandal.

>> anthony scaramucci has blown his own lid in an interview with ryan liza filled with expletives that is unbelievable. >> bombshell conversation in which the white house communications director launches a profain attack. >> he attacks in very vul tbar terms reince priebus an steve bannon. >> trevor: you're damn right it's vulgar. scaramucci just came in and set fire it reince priebus an steve bannon, he burnt them like a hoverboard, people. we can't go through all of the interview because it will break our bleep machine. but here is one thing, white house communications director scash muchi said about white house chief of staff, aka scaramucci's boss, reince priebus. he sead reince is a [bleep] paranoid scriz friendic. a p, r, noic, which i don't blame reince for, anybody working for trump would get that way. it's like being hannibal lechter's chef. >> it's only a matter of time, it's only a matter of time, it's

only a matter of time. here is mi favorite part. when the interviewer asked scar 34u67i about whether he likes media attention, he says quote i'm not steve bannon. i'm not trying to suck my own [bleep]. (laughter) oh man. first off, this is looking at bannon, i don't think that is physically possible. second, second, i feel like if that were true, steve bannon would be a lot more chilled out. like i didn't even know it was possible to drain your own swamp. this is just insane. i'm not going to lie, people, i love scaramucci already. is he kussing out all these coworkers, that is what you do when you quit, not when you start. maybe he just does things the opposite way, when he leaves the white house, he's going to be hi, i'm anthony, nice to meet you, reensz, night to meet you. what this feels like, i was stabbed because there was a breakup, and we were all like oh, spicer, we'll never get over you and then scaramucci walked in and we're like goddam, we're

moving on, baby, we're moving on. i'm telling you, this white house, you can't get this big a [bleep] in three air-- berlin. i let's move on. i said this before and only force on earth powerful enough to stop donald trump may be donald trump. ironic, you say, perhaps. but this week we saw it again bigly with a series of self-inflicted wounds that showed crystal clear that el presidente doesn't give an orange rat's ass about whether the rule of law or the conservative agenda prized by his fellow republicans comes to freuician. and he did it by picking on one of the people you would think would be closest to him. >> president trump blasts his own attorney general, steaming over jeff sessions recusal from the russia investigation. >> taking aim once again at attorney general jeff sessions on twitter. >> attacking attorney general jeff sessions as weak. >> the president refusing to say if he will fire his earliest and most loyal supporter.

>> i am disappointed in the attorney general. if he was going to recuse himself, he should have told me prior to taking office. and i would have quite simply picked somebody else. >> oh, if you knew in advance what jeff sessions would do, you would have picked someone else. now you know how america feels about your presidency. we all understand. (applause) donald trump's anger makes no sense. sessions had to recuse himself from an investigation into the trump campaign because he was part of the trump campaign. you can't investigate yourself. it's one of those things that is best done by another person like surgery or haircuts. oh, you did it yourself, i can tell, i can tell, yeah. now you may be thinking, what why is trump so upset with sessions now, his recusal was back in march, maybe it's because trump has gotten to the jeff sessions episode on his dvr or maybe, maybe it's because the man investigating the russia scandal bob mueller has his hand

on the thermostat and he is turning it way up. >> the special counsel is now looking into the trump business empire in the investigation of russian meddling in the u.s. election. >> trump has been fuming about the probe in recent weeks, as he has been informed about the legal questions that he and his family could face. he told he was especially concerned after learning mueller could access several years of his tax return. >> trevor: why is trump so scared of people seeing his tax returns, i'm genuinely flabbergasted. i'm like what you are afraid of. what could be worse than what we already know about him, what could be worse. we know everything, like, did he claim himself as putin's depend ent? what is in the tax return? i can't-- i don't even know what could be-- like did he list his birthday and birth place and it is actually kenya, and that is how it is, that is how i know, we grew up together, folks. we were like brothers. an before we go on, before we go on, what's just sit in this for

a minute. as attorney general, sessions is supposed to enforce the rules of the country. trump wants him only to enforce the rules of trump. that's not a president, that's a king. and america doesn't do kings. it's why they have reduced them to flipping burgers, right? yeah, that guy when he came here, he was very confident, very confident. he was like i'm here to reuvment and they were like you are going to rule this grill mother [bleep] now get cooking. and as the week went on, trump was hitting sessions harder and harder. >> the president now questioning the reason sessions backed him citing his campaign crowds in a new wall street journal interview. he was a senator from alabama. he looked at 40,000 people and he probably said what do i have to lose. and he endorsed me, so it's not like a great loyal thing about the endorsement. >> wow. when drump drops you, he drops you hard, man. just like throws the loyalty away. if you jumped on a grenade for trump he would be like, he just

did that because he wanted a set of those cool-- tbie is a total showboat, very sad. totally sad, folks. so because sessions can't protect trump from mueller, trump now wants to get rid of sessions. the only problem is the tiny man has big friends. >> the message from hill republicans to trump, firing sessions would be a mistake. >> i think the attorney general is doing a fine job and i think he made the right decision to recuse himself. >> he is not the president's personal lawyer. he is an attorney general of the united states. he took an oath to the constitution, not for the president. >> he doesn't work for the president, he works for a. >> if jeff sessions is fired there will be holy hell to pay. >> the presidency isn't a ball, and this country isn't a china shop. >> trevor: well, actually, this country is a china shop. america buys everything from china. i bet if you turned the actual

confident over it would say made in china. it sort of it. but i hear what you are saying. and you see those republicans, opposing sessions, they were explaining what donald trump has forgotten. on a pure political level, sessions is exactly the wrong guy for trump to mess with. and not because he's so powerful but because he of what he represents. before sessions joined his campaign, trump was a joke in washington. sessions didn't just bring his cookies to the campaign, he brought credibility. >> jeff sessions, who is legendary on immigration has now endorsed trump. >> the first sitting senator to get behind the billionaire's campaign. >> you get more from republicans, it becomes more and more his nomination. >> yeah. in other words, jeff sessions did for donald trump what dr. dre did for eminem. trust me, this crazy ass quite guy is the real deal, just trust me. sessions convinced the gop establishment that with him on board the trump administration would execute his agenda. he has been delivering. think about it, he is going to off to sanctuary cities, for

legal marijuana and gay people in the house of cards that is the trump administration, jeff sessions is the load-bearing wall. like if the white house is a clown car, jeff sessions is the only clown who knows how to drive. and thases' trump's dilemma. as one of the most impeachable presidents of all time, if he gets rid of sessions there is a very real chance that the republicans would get rid of him. in other words, with moves like this from trump, it appears steve bannon may not be the only one in the white house trying to screw himself. we'll be right back. (applause) refreshing beer. plus the crisp taste of apples. a great combination. like spanglish.... where it'd be something like "manza-beer". but redd's sounds much better... cheers. redd's apple ale. together we beer.

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[ screaming ] ♪ ♪ reach out touch - reach out touch faith ♪ atomic blonde. ♪ ready for action rated r. (cheers and applause). >> trevor: welcome back to the tailee show. when a new story falls through the cracks, lewis black catches it in a segment we call back in black. it's summer time in america. the only season it is acceptable to lure kids to your truck with the promise of sweets. it is also vacation time which means americans with travel plans have this to look forward to. >> for the vast majority who are

driving to the beach or that backyard barbecue, a new warning about this country's crumbling infrastructure. the summer travel kicks offer and the nation's aging roads, bridges, railroads and airports are again buckling under the load. >> the american society of civil engineers gives the facial's roads, railways, bridges and dams a grade of d plus. >> a d plus! we passed slasm independenty. -- independentee. that is right, america's infrastructure is in worse shape than rob kardashian and black china's relationship which i'm told is a sentence that makes sense. take trains, for example. >> decades of insufficient funding and infrastructure investment have left mark's passenger rail network lagging behind most of the developed world. >> amtrak has ordered 28 high speed trains for the northeast corridor. the problem, there are currently no plans, or the necessary funds to build the tracks needed to

support high speed rail. >> i'm going to go out on a limb here and say a high speed train without tracks is a low speed track. a train without tracks isn't even a train, it's a hobo [bleep] palace. so the government's hard at work building the little engine that couldn't. meanwhile people who can afford their own cars aren't having any better luck. >> a survey from triple a shows around 30 million drivers in this country experience pothole damage that requires a repair. but the average cost ranging from $250 up to more than $1,000. >> pothole problems, this road in ohio is so ridden with potholes local drivers are choosing to move to the sidewalk. >> there is that american ingenuity, we may not be able to fix this country's problems, but god bless us, we can drive around them. and i'm not picking on ohio

because if you want to see infrastructure at its worst, look no further than right here in the big broken apple. >> here in new york city today, chaos and panic underground as a subway hit a wall and derailed. >> this comes as the nation's busiest transit system is under fire for long delays it and cancelations. its with a subway ride from hell for the strap hangers on the f train last might. >> they were stuck inside the tunnel for nearly an hour without power or air conditioning. >> video inside the dark steamy train shows passengers fanning themselves. at one point desperately trying to claw their way out using books and umbrellas. >> i don't know what is worse, the fact that those guys are trapped in the claustrophobic underground sweat can or that some dowsh bag is filming them-- douchebag is filming them instead of helping. things have gotten so bad, even the ground seems to be rebelling against us. >> rough start to the day for a st. louis couple. they return to a parking spot to

find that their car has been swallowed by a giant sinkhole. >> this morning the terrifying sinkhole that swallowed two homes near tampa is massive. >> a giant sinkhole outside of this checkers in ocalla with a car teetering on the edge. >> a sinker hole opened newspaper front of president donald trump's mar-a-lago resort in florida. >> i do have to correct the news on one thing, however. that one outside the mar-a-lago wasn't a sinkhole, any time the president's in town, the devil stops by to say hi. and keep up the good work. trevor? >> trevor: thank you, lewis, lewis black, everyone, we'll be right back. cindy, you don't even have a dress.

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(cheers and applause). >> trevor: welcome back to the daily show. my guest tonight is an award-winning russian american journalist, professor at amherst college and author of the forth coming book, the future is

history. how total arianism reclaimed russia. please welcome masha gessen. (applause). >> trevor: welcome to the show. >> thank you. >> trevor: i cannot start the interview without commenting on your shirt, that is an interesting motif you have on there. >> this actually is a shirt from the 2011/2012 protest in russia. >> trevor: what does that shirt mean, putin must not wear a princess crown. >> yes, russians against tiaras. it is putin should not be a monday arc. >> trevor: right. >> we should have liberal democracy, that didn't work for awhile. >> trevor: let's talk about that. straight into that idea. put inshould not be a monday arc. do you think in many ways putin has managed to cement his power as, in effect, a monday arc of russia? >> absolutely. there are no elections. there are no elections for congress, and there is a

presidential election but no one can get on the ballot without putin's personal commission. and no one can campaign. >> this seems fair. i mean. >> he thinks is he the best person for the job. >> trevor: he genuinely does. is he someone who for a long time has felt though that his standing in the world has been diminished. is he someone who felt for a long time that russia isn't where it should be in the world. would you argue that that is all he wants from america and from the eu and all of the powerful nations out there? >> you know, the kind of leader that he is, basically, an autocrat, i don't think there is such a thing as all he wantings. is he very much wants to be taken seriously. he very much wants to be treated as an equal partner by the united states. but he will always want more. and it's in the nature of that kind of leadership to want to expand and it is also, he needs to constantly sort of create the illusion of movement in order to be able to mobilize the population. >> trevor: when you look at vladimir putin and you look at donald trump, are they the same

person, are they similar or are they aspects of what they are doing that reminded one of the other? >> they're not actually that similar. i mean emotionally they are completely different. trump is raw emotion and putin is, he prides himself on being so controlled. >> trevor: like trump crying watching a movie, i'm emotional. >> exactly. you know, they come from different histories everything about them is different. but there are certain things that i think are characteristic of autocrats that after 20 years of covering putin i sort of train my eyes to see that. like i have optics. >> trevor: such as. >> for trump and putin one amazing similarity is the way they lie, right? which most politicians, who sometimes lie, will want you to come around to their point of view. they want to get you to believe something. >> trevor: right. >> these guys lie to assert power. the more absurd what they say is, the more power they have asserted.

it is basically saying, you know, i will say whatever i want whenever i want to. >> trevor: i don't understand that. is that them basically having pot we are to define reality s that what it is? i truly don't understand how they see that as a powerful thing, you would assume everyone is looking at them going but you're lying. >> well, it's two things, actually. one is having the power to define reality, right. i'm not just president of the country, i'm king of the reality. it is also bully tactics. and then it's like the-- who say said stole your lunch books and you said you stole my lunch box and is he holding it and says no, i didn't steel your lunch box. and he has the power. >> trevor: when you look at trump and putin's relationship. the media has been to kusessing on it, you cannot escape it on the news in the u.s. do you feel this is the right amount of attention that should be paid to it or is there a different way to look at it, as someone who has been an expert on what the russians want, american relations, how do you think it should be handled as a topic, as

an idea. >> it's important, obviously. and russian defense-- i would argue actually what is out in the open is much more porntd than whatever investigation has at least at this point, right? and we saw donald trump say openly that he wants russia to hack hillary clinton's email. >> trevor: yes. >> and so i don't quite understand the excitement when a year later turns out that don, jr. said in private in confidence the exact same thing his dad said in public for all the world to hear. >> trevor: wouldn't some people say that is different, he said it but then he claimed that he was being sar cass particular whereas with don, jr. it looked like this was an action, these people were willing to collude with the russians. >> right, but i think again we knew that. and i think it's important to react to what is out in the open, what is out in the open is trump's admiration for putin, what is out in the open is trump's explicit understanding that political power is what putin does, that it is controlling a country, it's

governing by decree, it's basically going to establish your own-- . >> trevor: i believe the senate just moved the bill forward now to the president's desk. sanctions on russia. that seems like it will be a major poan for trump. he's going to have to openly say yes, i'm complete we with the united states or i'm going to deany this, i'm going to veto this bill and not support the sanctions. do we know anything about their relationship beyond what we're told in public? is there anything that we should be looking for as someone who is familiar with the russians and as someone who is seeing dn ald trump at the same time? >> so again, and i think that we should be looking, we should really at all costs try to avoid the kind of conspiracy thinking that a leader like trump who is himself a conspiracy ther rest produces, right. you want to narrow it and look for the hidden secret, instead of just starring at the truth that stares you in the face. but frankly, i don't think that putin is as interested in

lifting sanctions as he claims to be. i think the sanctions that russians are-- the sanks russians are interested in lifting are the ones that-- that is when they talk about it, they talk about those sanctions. those sanctions are important because they target people personally, they target their assets personally. and they have really felt the pain. when the country at large feels the pain, that actually is not, doesn't necessarily hurt putin. and in a way it is immobile-- a mobilizing tool for him. russia has been garyned around putin who has said that russia is at war with america, he has been saying that for basically the last four or five years. >> trevor: wow. scary story and the shirt that you are wearing makes it light at the same time. thank you so much for joining us. i appreciate your minds. the book is available, you can preorder now, masha gessen,

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this our show for tonight, here it is, your moment of zen. >> now the president here is a

picture of a collapseing hom captioning sponsored by comedy central >> announcer: ladies and gentlemen, the 45th and final president of the united states. ( cheers and applause ) >> mr. president! >> mr. president! >> mr. president! >> you're welcome. thank you. thank you. first, let me just take a moment to insult jeff sessions. jeff, you look like a melting gap kids mannequin. okay, jeff? you got it? moving on. >> how do you respond to criticism of your ban of transgender people in military service? >> like this: i'd like to