Trump slams 'disgraceful' leak of Mueller questions

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Trump slams 'disgraceful' leak of Mueller questions

Dozens of special counsel's questions for the president leaked to press; reaction and analysis on 'The Five.'

This is a rush transcript from "The Five," May 1, 2018. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

KIMBERLY GUILFOYLE, CO-HOST: Hello, everyone. I'm Kimberly Guilfoyle along with Juan Williams, Jesse Watters, Dana Perino and Greg Gutfeld. It's 5 o'clock in New York City, and this is "The Five."

What does Robert Mueller want to ask President Trump? Well, dozens of questions are now out in the public for the world to see. Questions that were reportedly read to the president's legal team in March that leaked to the media, the president called the leaks disgraceful in the tweet. Sarah Sanders directed questions to Mr. Trump's legal team at the briefing earlier, but her deputy, Raj Shah, had this to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAJ SHAH, WHITE HOUSE PRINCIPAL DEPUTY PRESS SECRETARY: I don't know the veracity or the accuracy of that leak. But if they are accurate, the overwhelming majority of those questions don't focus on the underlying premise of the special counsel which was to focus on this issue of collusion with the Russian government. There's been over a year of investigation. There're been dozens of witnesses, thousands of documents, millions, actually, of pages of documents provided, and zero evidence. Not a shred of evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUILFOYLE: Alan Dershowitz thinks there's a strategy designed these questions with the special counsel design to trip up President Trump.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, LAW PROFESSOR: The questions are very in artfully drawn. They are written as open-ended questions. They're really designed to let him ramble and talk, and I suspect that's the strategy of the special counsel because they know that, maybe, President Trump's weakness, if they were to ask him direct, tough questions to which he can answer yes or no, that might not give them the advantage they're seeking.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUILFOYLE: OK. So, that's Dershowitz discussing the strategy, Dana, that he thinks is being employed here. To say, listen, ask these questions, open-ended, etcetera, so he can give a long and lengthy answer and there may be some meat and details in there to trip him up.

DANA PERINO, CO-HOST: I don't know, because I think that they're professional enough to know like -- maybe they have something, maybe they don't. Like, actually, none of us really know. But, I do think that yes, the questions were open-ended. As I understand it, it's really unusual for anyone to be given a list, especially 44 questions, or 49, however many it was, beforehand. I could see why they're open-ended, because if you started providing all the questions that you would want a yes or no answer to, then, of course, that would look a little weird too. To me, this is like -- this is a range of topics that we want to go over with him. And, yes, many of these could be a wolf in sheep's clothing, as the James Trustee who's the lawyer on the 2 o'clock show today was saying that, yeah, this could end up being something where you don't want to have your client do an interview. I think that that's possibly was strategy behind the leak. I don't think this leak came from the Mueller team. I do think it came from somebody either associated with the legal team or something like that. To say, you know what, get it out there. Let everybody start talking about it. And then, either, for the lawyers to be able to say, see, Mr. President, everybody thinks that you shouldn't do an interview with Mueller. And try to get him to agree.

GUILFOYLE: OK. All right. So, Greg, how do you see it? Do you agree with your co-counsel.

GREG GUTFELD, CO-HOST: I think the leak came from Fox & Friends.

(LAUGHTER)

GUTFELD: Treasure trove. We keep hearing the phrase.

GUILFOYLE: That's helpful.

GUTFELD: We keep hearing the phrase treasure trove. This is a treasure trove.

GUILFOYLE: Right.

GUTFELD: . maybe. But it might be a treasure trove for Republicans, because this -- if you're going to be counting on winning the house, I don't know if this Russian stuff is actually going to help you. I think over time this is becoming a squalid distraction. And the more insane it gets, I think, the more it actually helps Republicans. I think Trump should say, you know, we'll answer these things in writing, and then just beat people over the head with this stuff. Because, the fact is, when you look at what's going on in the world, what's missing? What are we not seeing now that we used to see doing The Five? ISIS videos. Almost every week we saw an ISIS video. For months, we talked about the nuclear threat of North Korea. These are two existential threats that are missing from our newsfeed.

And I do think the media is completely unprepared to report Trump's successes. They don't have that in their toolbox. You have two major things missing and you don't know what to report, so you focus on pornography and your focus on collusion. Collusion, which is falling apart and has been falling apart, now it's going to become about obstruction, but they don't have that in their toolkit, so they're left doing this. And what's the end result? I don't know really what they want. I've talked about impeachment. But if you impeach a president in the middle of some really historic achievements, history will not be kind to you. The voters will not be kind to you. No one will be kind to you.

GUILFOYLE: Interesting. So, you're saying the media has got a very empty box. So still, like, snap on tools. Snap off media. Snap on bias.

GUTFELD: Exactly, snap on turtles.

JESSE WATTERS, CO-HOST: Well, I think they.

GUILFOYLE: Snapping turtles.

WATTERS: They don't care if he fails. I think they're more worried about him succeeding, because when Trump succeeds, it just shows that a nonpolitician could come in and rewrite the game. I'm terrified of these questions, Kimberly. I looked at these questions last night. I don't think Mueller has a case against the president, but it's clear he's building.

GUTFELD: Right.

WATTERS: . a very, very deadly serious case against the presidents. I wouldn't go near Robert Mueller with these questions. If you answer these questions under oath, you're going to be impeached. This is very, very dangerous. Here's why. Half a dozen.

(CROSSTALK)

WATTERS: Half a dozen of these questions are about his tweets.

(LAUGHTER)

WATTERS: I mean, if you can get indicted for tweeting something. That is crazy. I think Mueller is trying to criminalize the exercise in presidential power. Look at this, the Flynn thing. They asked one question. Did you discuss pardoning Flynn? Is that illegal to discuss pardoning somebody? Where is that going? I mean, this is -- it's an obstruction case, let's be honest with you. Again, the hat jack, that's what they're going after Flynn for. You can't as a transitional officer talk to counterpart in Russia a month before your boss is sworn in? Every administration does that. Why is this criminal? That act isn't been use for two centuries. Look at the Comey stuff. It's about his dinners, his phone calls, what he was thinking when he fired Comey. It's about a thought crime. You have to -- in order to charge obstruction, you have to show corrupt intent.

Now, if Hillary Clinton deleted 30,000 emails after they were subpoenaed, and Comey couldn't find intent there, I don't see how they can find that with President Trump. Sessions, they're asking about Jeff Sessions. You know, when he tweeted he wasn't tough enough on Hillary, what did you mean by that? I mean, it sounds like -- it's like a therapist in a room with a client. They don't sound like -- they're trying to get into the mind of the president, and that's a dangerous place to be for a number of reasons, especially when you're trying to prosecute these thought crimes, these process crimes, like a perjury or an objection.

Look at the collusion case. It's about the meeting at Trump Tower. Remember, this lawyer comes in, says she has dirt on Hillary, she ends up having nothing, wants to discuss adoption, and they kicked her out of Trump Tower in 15 minutes. But guess what, right before she goes into Trump Tower, she meets with the founder of Fusion GPS, the guy behind the dossier. Who else granted her.

GUILFOYLE: Well, there's the collusion.

WATTERS: Right. Who granted her an extraordinary visa to come to the country at the last second? Loretta Lynch. Mueller hasn't even interviewed the Russian lawyer. He hasn't even interviewed her yet. So, the only thing that I don't understand is they're asking a question about Manafort, and, you know, maybe he reached out to the Russians or the Russians reached out to them. That's new information that I hadn't seen. That's pretty alarming. But most of these questions, a danger zone.

GUTFELD: Quote Kenny Loggins.

WATTERS: It's a danger zone out there.

GUILFOYLE: All right, Juan, so there's a litany there that Jesse went through. But we can see we're all flushing at certain point.

WATTERS: No, that's just the jacket.

GUTFELD: By the way, I look at humor bar.

(LAUGHTER)

GUILFOYLE: He's talking about -- they didn't interview this lawyer. And she spoke with people from the Fusion GPS before going in. So that looks like there was some kind of meeting of the minds there or specific intent to try to go in and trap somebody. So, what's going on with that? And why isn't Mueller followed and connected the dots there?

JUAN WILLIAMS, CO-HOST: I think you have her meeting with them before -- I mean, what she -- she's not meeting to discuss what she was meeting to discuss with Donald Jr., which was, apparently, dirt on Hillary Clinton. And, of course, we know that the campaign should not have been involved with that. They should have immediately called the FBI and said somebody is trying to interfere here, foreign power, foreign governments that's actually.

WATTERS: Hillary paying for a foreign power to interfere to get the warrant.

WILLIAMS: That's not true.

(CROSSTALK)

WILLIAMS: Anyway, it's not true. But let me just continue for the moment.

WATTERS: Well, we have the money trail.

WILLIAMS: I think what we're dealing with here is the ongoing negotiations over whether or not Mueller gets to talk to Donald Trump. And so, you had John Dowd who was the president's lawyer saying don't ever talk to this guy. This will trip you up. We know you're given to hyperbole and sometimes that fabrication, and then you will be caught up in some kind of lying thing. Don't do it. Trump was not listening to Dowd. Dowd exits. In comes Rudy Giuliani, who last week met with Mueller, has worked with Mueller in the past. Lots of talk today about who leaked this, and I'm sorry to say that much of it is about Rudy Giuliani as the new guy, the new player on the block. And what would Giuliani's intent be in leaking this document?

I think you heard earlier some of my colleagues here say they think it's an effort to put pressure on Trump, so that Trump says, oh, I'm disgusted with all of this. I'm never going to do this. If I add that several lawyers are saying today that if, in fact, it was Trump or Trump's surrogate who leaked this that that may, in fact, contribute to an obstruction of justice case. So, I mean, it gets crazy. It does gets crazy. But, the idea is that the majority does of the questions do relate, as you were saying, Jesse, to obstruction of justice. It's not to say that it's the effort to try to prove collusion is now defunct. To the contrary, as you point out, there's the outreach element, Paul Manafort's outreach. There's the question about Flynn having discussions with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador.

(CROSSTALK)

WILLIAMS: No, no, no. Not while the other guy is in office. You do not undercut American foreign policy.

WATTERS: So, you can't get in touch with your counterpart as you come in as the national security advisor?

WILLIAMS: You can get in touch -- you can introduce yourself, but you do not have discussions about sanctions. So, what you're also seeing is that people are saying, you know, if Trump leaked it, there's a problem. If Trump leaked it, then where do we go with this? And I think the answer is that Trump never talks to Mueller.

GUTFELD: Can I do something that no one else will do?

PERINO: Yeah.

GUTFELD: I would like to connect this entire story to Iran, all right? How does one do that? Whether it is Mueller, collusion, or Iran, all of this is about President Obama and his feverish fanatical commitment to preserve his legacy. He sold out us in Iran for his legacy. He made common cause with Putin. That's the real collusion, because Putin to get to Iran to keep the Iran deal. Remember the red line? Didn't happen. That was because of Syria, and because of Russia, and because of Putin.

So, when Trump got elected, that threw everything into disarray, right? President Obama was not prepared for that to happen. So, he's thinking Iran deal. He's also thinking, holy crap, what about my legacy in general? The machine gets back to working to defend his legacy. The machine starts. Obviously, Obama knew about the tarmac meeting. He knew about the dossier. He knew about the Clinton investigation. He knew about the FISA warrant. If he didn't know about that stuff, what the hell was he doing?

WILLIAMS: In your opinion, Obama can never win.

GUTFELD: No, he's responsible for all of this. Impeach Obama.

(LAUGHTER)

GUTFELD: I've built a time machine while I was watching Kanye on TMZ. And, I'm going back to impeach Obama.

WILLIAMS: What about Clinton? Impeach Hillary -- lock her up.

GUTFELD: No, I would go back and impeach Bill.

GUILFOYLE: OK. What about the peace prize?

GUTFELD: Yes, I'll do it twice.

GUILFOYLE: OK, all right.

GUTFELD: This one will stick.

GUILFOYLE: All right, Greg, join us. Roseanne Barr has a very direct message for all those knocking her support for President Trump, and it is coming up next. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WATTERS: Roseanne Barr is refusing to back away from her support of President Trump, and is using some colorful language to fire back at critics.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: Would it be because people that aren't so happy as well, if you say that you're supportive of Donald Trump or.

ROSEANNE BARR, ACTRESS: Oh, yeah, people are mad about that.

UNINDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah.

BARR: But, you know, I don't give a (BLEEP).

(APPLAUSE)

BARR: Everybody has to choose for themselves according to their own conscience who they thought was the lesser of two evils. So, I'm not going to put anybody down who didn't vote like me. This is America. It's a free country. And, you know, when you weigh it all together, you know, I think, I just felt like we needed a whole new thing all the way, bottom to top.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WATTERS: Her Trump support isn't the only thing that has the left riled up. Liberals are now also telling Kanye West to shut up after his comments about the president. Here's Congressman Maxine Waters, no relation, quote, sometimes Kanye West talks out of turn, and perhaps, sometimes, he needs some assistance in helping him to formulate some of his thoughts. We don't think that he actually means to do harm, but we're sure he really understands the impact of what he saying -- not sure. I think, maybe, he should think twice about politics, and maybe not have so much to say. So, Greg, I have to start with Maxine here. Has trouble formulating his thoughts?

GUTFELD: She was right in the front part and wrong in the last. He does talk out of turn, and we should all be talking out of turn. That's what happens when you talk out of turn. He actually left the box that she wanted him in, and she's saying you really shouldn't do that. You should really say exactly what we expect you to say, and that's what happened, same thing with Roseanne. The reason why people are upset is because -- it's not like the liberal -- it's not like liberal celebrity is pushing climate change on you, right? Everybody gets that. Once a celebrity says something that is not part of the liberal world, all hell breaks loose. And it's because they're actually leaving their bubble.

So, they get -- if you saw Kanye West right now -- today on TMZ with him, and Candace Owens was there, it was insane how they treat -- it was like -- it was one of the most vibrant discussions and it's necessary to hear this stuff because you don't hear it because the entertainment industry is so uniform and they expected to live by a certain kind of belief system. And so, it's refreshing. And I thought that the way she swore -- you know, I don't like people swearing for the sake of swearing, but that was very natural.

WATTERS: Yes, she dropped that pretty effectively. So, Greg says the entertainment industry is pretty uniform, also the media industry, and, probably, you know, Hollywood.

PERINO: I think entertainment is even way more so than the media.

WATTERS: Right. So, when people get out of line.

PERINO: Yeah.

WATTERS: . get back in line.

PERINO: So, over the weekend, Jesse, I read a novel.

(LAUGHTER)

WATTERS: How many?

PERINO: I reread a book that I read as a kid, A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle.

WATTERS: Yes, by Madeleine L'Engle, yeah.

PERINO: Yes, I'm sure you remember it. And, I try to remember -- why did I like that, why did I read that book over and over again as a kid? And what we teach children -- your parents is trying to teach children is that you shouldn't be individualistic. You should embrace all of your independent thoughts. That whole book is about nonconformity and about rejecting being the same. And -- why are you laughing?

GUTFELD: I'm not.

PERINO: Are you laughing at me?

GUTFELD: No, I was listening.

PERINO: Paranoid. So, we teach children that. And then, at some point, it's been turning around. And we're going to get to Greg's segment in the D-block, which is even more of this. Like, it's spreading like a disease. That's why it's important to remember those stories that you're taught as a kid. Which is being different and expressing your self is, actually -- it should be encouraged in America.

WATTERS: Why can't you tolerate difference, Juan?

(LAUGHTER)

WILLIAMS: I don't think this is about difference, or nonconformity, or jumping out of a box. I think this is about having a thought that is not properly formed, and that's why you heard Maxine Waters say, you know, he needs help formulating his thinking.

(CROSSTALK)

WILLIAMS: . encourages original thinking. We all want new ways of thinking. We're the light to turn on and say, hey, that's a great idea. This will solve America's problem. But, what you get from Kanye West is just kind of -- where did that come from? He suddenly says, oh, yeah, I'm a Trump supporter because I was in the hospital he said come on over, and you say what is that have to do with anything? And he has no answer for that. And then, you say, oh, but it's about blacks all thinking in the box. Do you think black people can't think for themselves and don't have the capacity to say is this good for our community? Is this good for me and my family? Of course, people can. But people come to that, and the basis of real substantive action, taken or not taken, by the person you're discussing, Donald Trump. So, I think it's kind of insulting to black Americans to say, oh, Kanye says something and now, oh, gosh. All the -- all the Trump -- we're Kanye's fan. I don't think you're Kanye fans back after Katrina is going after Bush. I don't think when he was saying, oh, Cosby this. I don't think you were big Kanye fans. But now, everybody on the right, oh, Kanye, Kanye.

GUTFELD: He just came out in favor of gun control. I'm still OK with him.

WATTERS: Kimberly, what if Trump's policy were good to black America. And you have seen low black unemployment.

GUILFOYLE: Right.

WATTERS: . lower food stamps, shootings down in Chicago. Things are getting a little bit better under his presidency. Would he get any credit in the black community for that?

GUILFOYLE: Yeah, I believe and hope that he would, in fact. Because people can see and feel tangible results, whether you see the crime is down, or street feel safer, or the job market has improved, the economy, the numbers in terms of people being able to provide for their families, feeling a little less, you know, tightening of the belt in terms of trying to really hold back money, or worry about finances, et cetera. People care about safe communities and their children being able to go to school. They care about being able to buy groceries at the end of the week, and celebrate family birthdays and things like that. That's what everybody cares about universally. And no community should be left behind. And I think it's important to acknowledge inroads that the president is making in the black community and trying to help with minority communities.

WILLIAMS: Let me just quickly -- let me pick up quickly on something you were saying, which is that Bob Johnson, the billionaire creator of Black Entertainment Television, like the other day he's on TV praising President Trump. Nobody reacted to him. You know why? He said, specifically, that he was thrilled with the lower unemployment numbers. Yes, it started under Obama and continued to.

WATTERS: So, why did all the congressional black caucus sit on their hands when they announced that at the state of the union? Seems like a nice thing to clap about. Next, we go live to West Virginia where the stage is set for the Fox News Channel first primary debate in the midterm election season.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PERINO: Welcome back. President Trump issuing a strong message to Republicans as the midterm primary season heats up.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We cannot be complacent. We've got to go out, right? We've got to go out. We've got to go out and we've got to fight like hell. And we've got to win the house and we've got to win the Senate. And I think we're going to do great in the Senate, and I think we're going to do great in the house, because the economy is so good.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PERINO: And one Senate race that the GOP is betting on, West Virginia. Three GOP candidates are vying for the nomination to take on Democrat Joe Manchin in November. Republicans believe this is a seat right for flipping. President Trump won the state by more than 40 points in 2016. And in a little over an hour from now, the Fox News Channel will kick off our first debate of the midterm election season in the battleground state. Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum are moderating, and they join us now from the Metropolitan Theatre in Morgantown. You guys got to go to one of America's most beautiful states. I wanted to ask you -- Chris Stirewalt gave a little bit of a tease on the Daily Briefing earlier today. He said the questions were quite good, and I wondered how did you take something -- a race like this that is actually has national attention, but the candidates really want to focus on local issues. How did you figured out how to ask those types of questions?

BRET BAIER, FOX NEWS: Hi, Dana. We've had a lot of fun putting together the questions. This is going to be a great debate, because it's not only touches on West Virginia issues but a lot of West Virginia issues touch on national issues. The opioid crisis here is outsized and, obviously, it's a major crisis around the country. But there are a lot of issues that intersect. And we've been working for a while on trying to come up with good pointy questions.

MARTHA MACCALLUM, FOX NEWS: It's also a really interesting race given how well President Trump did here, and the fact that he's an 87 percent approval rating in West Virginia, Dana. So, all of these candidates have tried to, kind of, "out-Trump" each other. So, we're going to try to see how Trumpy they are and where they differ from the president at certain things. So, that's going to be an interesting test. And I think it's also something that applies to all the midterm races in one way, shape or form across the country, and this is a great place to start.

PERINO: OK. Well, all of us have questions. We'll go to Juan, next.

WILLIAMS: Hi, I was so interested in the lineup. So tonight, you've got Evan Jenkins, Patrick Morrisey, Don Blankenship. And Morrissey, of course, is the West Virginia attorney general, and speaking to exactly what Bret was talking about, which is the opioid crisis. He is the guy who had sued the DEA. He says that he wants to know more. But then, the comeback is that his wife was representing some of these pharmaceutical companies. It seems to me that it's a very difficult, difficult way for him to go here. And I don't know exactly how he handles that. Do you have any idea?

BAIER: Don't take all our questions, Juan. I mean, come on.

MACCALLUM: We hadn't thought of that one.

BAIER: Seriously.

MACCALLUM: Exactly. It is an interesting situation for all of them, because they've all tried to prove that they have done something substantial on this issue. This is the No. 1 nation [SIC]. It's a sad distinction that they lose more people here to opioid deaths than any other state across the country.

So clearly, they've all tried to be distinctive on this. And Patrick Morrisey, as you say, has a reputation for having gone after some of these companies, but he's had a complicated background. And I think that's all I'm going to say. We'll see where he's going to go on that.

BAIER: We have a lot of questions that -- that that factors in. You know, like their pasts individually and how they deal with big issues that affect this state.

And then the other, you know, elephant in the room is Joe Manchin, who's very popular in this state, despite the fact that, as a Trump-favoring state, he's voted against repealing Obamacare and the president's tax cuts.

PERINO: All right. Jesse.

WATTERS: Yes, you just mentioned it. I mean, he -- he has voted against the tax cuts and voted against the Obamacare repeal. But he has voted with the president about 60 percent of the time. Yet his approval rating plummeted about 17 points from the beginning of the year.

When the Republican nominee gets there in November, is this going to be a close race, or is this going to be tight?

BAIER: It depends on who they eventually nominate and who's best positioned against Joe Manchin. And that's really what West Virginia Republicans want to know, is who on this stage is really going to be best positioned to go up against Manchin, because this could be one of the races that determines the balance of power in the U.S. Senate and, thereby, the future of the Trump administration.

MACCALLUM: Yes, they all have vulnerabilities, but I think they do see that there is some blood in the water right now where Joe Manchin is concerned. As you say, his approval numbers have dipped considerably, and he's vulnerable.

So this is a state that Republicans want to try to pick up, because they're very well aware that they may lose some across other places in the country, and they're trying to shore up those numbers on the Senate side, because the numbers are not looking that great on the House side.

PERINO: All right. Kimberly.

GUILFOYLE: Hi, good evening, you guys. Good luck tonight. We'll be watching.

BAIER: Very good, Kimberly.

GUILFOYLE: This is one of the races that everybody is really paying close attention to. Because as you've said, it appears that, you know, Joe Manchin has somewhat of a target on his back, being vulnerable with his plummeting poll numbers and also the close association in the past with President Obama, Hillary Clinton, the attack on coal in that -- in that particular state, making him somewhat vulnerable. He's also facing an environmental challenge. Or he's not running unopposed in the primary.

BAIER: Right, and you know, Rolling Stone just did a big piece on the challenger to Joe Manchin on the Democratic side. We say we expect that the people on this stage will face Joe Manchin, and that's what most people on the stage expect, is that he's going to win that primary challenge.

But the tough part for them on the stage is to differentiate themselves from each other. Martha said, "Who is going to try to out-Trump each other?" You know, on policy, they're very similar, but in personality and their backgrounds, they are very different.

PERINO: All right, Greg. What you got?

GUTFELD: I've got my Bret Bear. I'll be watching the --

BAIER: Seriously. I'm getting killed on Twitter.

GUTFELD: I'm going to -- I'm going to be watching.

GUILFOYLE: He's a snuggly guy.

GUTFELD: I'm going to watch your special coverage, holding the bear. And that's all I'm going to say for now. Because the bear means everything.

BAIER: Wow. Wow.

GUILFOYLE: Oh, my gosh.

MACCALLUM: What more can you say, really?

GUILFOYLE: How can you? Is that a name tag down there?

GUTFELD: No, he's got a flag pin.

GUILFOYLE: OK, Greg.

PERINO: Bret Baier, you are certainly famous all over the country, especially in Morgantown.

And Martha, Bret, it will be great to watch tonight. It's fun to see it all get underway. So we'll be watching. Thanks for joining us.

BAIER: First Amendment. Thanks.

PERINO: All right. Thank you guys.

Special coverage begins at 6 p.m. Eastern on "Special Report," followed by analysis on the story at 7:30.

Ahead, Greg's on the prom dress making headlines. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GUTFELD: Out of dumb stories comes a great lesson. It starts with a high school student posting photos in her prom dress on social media. She's white and wore a traditional Chinese dress. This, according to the media, sparked outrage over cultural appropriation.

First, always beware of such B.S. Stories like this are based on some weenie faking offense. And the media breathlessly covers it, because we're just suckers for outrage.

But as always, the cultural appropriation offense is a sham. The idea that it's racist to incorporate something from another culture is so morally bankrupt it's actually deadly. Over time, healthy people adopt practices that enhance their lives, meaning they steal good things, not the bad. But all things come from somewhere else. So appropriation isn't just a complement to a culture, it's how civilizations thrive.

Do you wear pajamas? If you're not an Indian Muslim, you're racist. Pajamas originated from Indian Muslims. And God forbid the sheets you sleep on are of Egyptian cotton.

Do you eat yogurt? I bet a lot of social justice warriors do. How racist is that to appropriate the diet of Central Asian herdsmen from 6000 B.C.?

Do you walk upright? How dare you steal the practice initiated by Ardipithecus ramidus, the earliest hominid from Ethiopia.

In sum, if you live your life by avoiding cultural appropriation, you'd have no life whatsoever. You didn't even evolve. At best, you'd just be stupid, which is a trait found in all cultures and stories generated by Twitter.

PERINO: Oh, that was funny.

GUTFELD: You know, it all started with some kid named Jeremy who said, "My culture is not your G-D prom dress." He got 4,2000 retweets, so that makes it a story.

PERINO: Right. That's what I was going to say, is that part of it is that we are so -- we have become so dependent on Twitter to actually help us figure out what the news is that we cover stupid stuff like this as news.

GUTFELD: Exactly.

PERINO: And this poor girl. She said, "I just thought it was a beautiful dress. I wanted to wear a beautiful dress." And she found it at a thrift store, a vintage shop in Utah.

GUTFELD: Yes. You know, Jesse, cultural appropriation. Imagine if a miracle drug is made in Germany. If you are not from Germany, you should say, "Oh, no, I can't take that drug. It's from another -- I'd be appropriating their medicinal expertise."

WATTERS: Like if I wanted to wear lederhosen and go to Oktoberfest.

PERINO: I want you to wear that.

WATTERS: You're saying I as an American can't do that?

GUILFOYLE: A perfect outfit for you.

GUTFELD: I would not want him to.

WATTERS: Giving away my right to wear lederhosen. It's crazy. That means those kind of crusty hippie white girls that are liberals can't do the dreadlocks with the Rasta thing.

GUTFELD: No.

WATTERS: That means black Americans can't wear English peacoats. There's a whole list of things you can or cannot do if you're going to abide by the strict rules of cultural appropriation.

GUILFOYLE: And you did this one time, I recall. Remember the time you had to wear the little J. Crew jacket and shorts on "Outnumbered"?

WATTERS: Yes. That was just bad fashion appropriation.

GUTFELD: Oh, yes, that was a mistake.

GUILFOYLE: That was interesting.

GUTFELD: Juan, is there any example of cultural appropriation that is actually real? Like, an outrage?

WILLIAMS: An outrage?

GUTFELD: I mean, I can understand individual mistakes at Halloween, something that's very stupid. But cultural appropriation meaning like, I'm wearing, you know, a peacoat. It's British. I shouldn't be wearing that.

WILLIAMS: Well, I can tell you one that just outraged me recently on this show. When you guys loved Kanye West. Rap music. Well, OK, if you're going to take rap music --

WATTERS: Eminem took that a long time ago.

WILLIAMS: Oh, I see.

PERINO: Wait until Kanye sings a country song.

WILLIAMS: There we go. Coming soon, Dana. Coming to a radio near you.

GUTFELD: The first rapper was really David Bowie.

WILLIAMS: Is that it? OK. Well, he married a black woman. Right? See what I'm talking about? It doesn't stop anywhere, America.

You know, I was very interested in this because the idea that, as Kimberly, I think, was saying a moment ago, you look back at the Halloween thing; and you get a lot of the fraternities and sororities, they get in trouble. And they said they are dressing up, let's say, like black people or, like, they put on the sombrero, and they say, "We're dressing up for" -- actually May 5 is coming up. And they say, "Oh, we're like Hispanic -- the Hispanic people." Whoa. Hold on, what are you doing here?

It's not a matter of making fun of us if you are part of us and can understand it.

GUTFELD: Right.

WILLIAMS: But I don't think this young lady was making fun --

GUTFELD: No, of course not.

WILLIAMS: -- of Chinese people with wearing it. I think she thought it was a nice dress.

GUTFELD: It's a beautiful dress.

WILLIAMS: I just don't -- I think it's overdone.

GUILFOYLE: Well, you know, there's nice stores. You look in the fashion market, like, Shanghai, that have really pretty dresses that are celebrating, you know, the fashion, the tapestry, the materials that are used to make dresses. I have a very nice black dress kind of like that, that was made. It's silk and has a little bit of a pattern on it.

So why wouldn't she -- she wanted to choose it because she thought it was a beautiful dress, and she wanted to have a special night and look great. I don't know. It's hard, because people impugn motives perhaps, on her that she wasn't thinking about.

PERINO: And I like that it seems like this generation of high school students, the women, the young girls are picking dresses that they don't all look the same. Part of the whole thing is to show more personality and individualism.

GUILFOYLE: Individuality.

GUTFELD: Not just women, Dana. Men are picking dresses, as well.

WILLIAMS: What do you make of the fact that she made the prayer gesture? Now, was that a little bit much?

PERINO: No. No. It's fine.

WATTERS: Praying is OK, Juan.

GUTFELD: The villain in this whole thing is the person who tweeted. Because he knew that the outrage, he wasn't really even mad. He just knew it would get picked up and end up on a successful show like "The Five," hosted by all of us.

GUILFOYLE: Parents start silent screaming inside. Like, "Please don't post that."

GUTFELD: All right, the comedian from the White House Correspondents' Dinner has more to say, and the late-night hosts are rushing to her defense. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WILLIAMS: A lot of people weren't happy with the comedian chosen to perform at this weekend's White House Correspondents' Dinner. That includes the group that selected her. The late-night hosts however, different story. They've rushed to Michelle Wolf's defense.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN COLBERT, HOST, CBS'S "THE LATE SHOW WITH STEPHEN COLBERT": This was a roast, and you're the ones who hired Michelle Wolf. Being mad at her for doing her job is like accusing a valet of briefly stealing your car.

JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, ABC'S "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE!": You know, they hire these comedians because they're edgy, and then they get mad when they're edgy at the thing.

SETH MEYERS, NBC'S "LATE NIGHT WITH SETH MEYERS": You hired her. That's like a parent sending an email saying, "Yesterday's birthday was meant to celebrate Kevin turning 6 years old. Unfortunately, the stripper's dance routine was not in the spirit of the party."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WATTERS: That's pretty good.

WILLIAMS: Wow. Anyway, in a new interview, Wolf says she wouldn't change one word that she said Saturday night. What do you think, Greg?

GUTFELD: Well, everybody there is absolutely 100 percent correct. And we even said this on our show yesterday. The White House Correspondents' Association, it was an incredibly cowardly move on their part. They hired her. They knew what she was about to do. They wanted an edgy -- they wanted shock. And they've done this. And then they distanced themselves. It's just completely -- it's cowardice.

And you know what? The next person that's asked to do it is going to have to formulate, you know, this occurrence. Like, "Should I skip it because what if I go too far? Will they have my back?"

The interesting, though, is the same group of people that defended the comic didn't defend Kanye, which tells you who's more daring.

WILLIAMS: Dana.

PERINO: Well, I do think that comedians often do stick up for each other, because they know what it's like, thinking it could happen to them.

It's sort of like I do feel like we that do live television are sometimes more willing to come to the defense of people who maybe make a mistake live on air, because you just know what it's like. So I think that it's appropriate for them to defend her.

WILLIAMS: So Jesse, Seth Meyers said it's wonderful. These are wonderful qualities, being edgy, insulting, badgering. Coming from a comedian but not from a world leader. And yet, you see the same people who are upset with Michelle Wolf accept this kind of language from President Trump.

WATTERS: Yes, but Trump is usually counter punching.

WILLIAMS: Oh.

WATTERS: And I don't think Sarah Sanders did anything to deserve what she got from Michelle Wolf.

But can we just address what Greg said in the break? Greg tried to claim that black people culturally appropriated rap from white people.

GUTFELD: No. I said that David Bowie was the first to rap on a song, "Golden Years." And then somebody tweeted me and said it was Bob Dylan, I think, "Subterranean Homesick Blues."

WATTERS: OK. Black people stole rap from Dylan.

GUTFELD: But I never used that phrase.

WATTERS: No, I --

GUTFELD: Fake news!

WATTERS: I misappropriated your phraseology.

WILLIAMS: I'm going to -- I'll tell you what, I'm going to introduce white people on this show to the blues. But that's later.

GUTFELD: You give us -- you give us the blues.

WILLIAMS: So -- so what was interesting was that Michelle Wolf in her interview, Kimberly, said, "Gee, I made fun of Mitch McConnell's neck. I made fun of Chris Christie's weight. Nobody has any problem with that. They're just upset about Trump."

GUILFOYLE: Yes, well, I mean, look, the problem is you're seeing a little bit of back-and-forth and you're seeing the story play out over a couple of days.

But I still take it back to the actual event, what transpired, what happened. Unkind, the mean-spirited things that were said, the bullying of Sarah Huckabee Sanders. And, you know, I'm still very upset about what happened there. I get that the comedians are coming to the defense, you know, of Michelle. OK, that's what they do, because they have to protect sort of their genre, what they do, their type of comedy.

And a lot of it is very anti- you know, President Trump. Very much, like, negative, holding up severed heads. The Shakespeare in the Park stuff. Just a very intense level of, you know, vitriol that really doesn't show any kind of respect for -- you know, for the office of the presidency or for the women that work for him, quite frankly.

WILLIAMS: Well, the one thing I thought was new was that Jimmy Finkelstein, who's the publisher of The Hill -- and I write a column for The Hill -- has decided that he's pulling out. No more going to the White House Correspondents' Dinner. Which is something The New York Times decided a wild back. So we'll see where this goes.

GUILFOYLE: Dana said no more comedians.

WILLIAMS: "One More Thing" -- I'm sorry, what'd you say?

GUILFOYLE: Dana said no more comedians.

WILLIAMS: Oh, OK. "One More Thing," it's up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GUILFOYLE: All right, kiddies. Time now for "One More Thing." Jesse, what do you have for us?

WATTERS: Ouch, that hurts. So remember Pizza Rat? Yes, this rat became famous for dragging a piece of lunch across the stairs somewhere in downtown Manhattan. Well, guess what? Pizza Rat is back.

This is the 2018 version of Pizza Rat.

PERINO: Oh, my God.

WATTERS: There he is. We don't know if it's the same rat or a different rat. We haven't interviewed the rat yet. I think Griff Jenkins is going to go out there with the camera.

Apparently, the rat loves de Blasio. He can roam around the city wherever he wants. No one ever bothers him. No one ever tries to kill him. He's very well -protected here in the city.

GUILFOYLE: No stopping on the bridge.

GUTFELD: No, it's not true. De Blasio is killing all the rats. He is. Yes.

GUILFOYLE: OK, fake news.

OK. In real news, this is what a cutie-patootie. Take a look. Lennox Salcedo, the adorable 3-year-old little baseball player. And this has gone viral with his hilarious run to home plate. He's playing a baseball game in his hometown of Walnut, California, where the coach told him to run to home base as fast as he could. So he had his own little interpretation of those. He went the exact opposite way and then he ran in slow motion instead.

WATTERS: Hot dog.

GUILFOYLE: That's what happened. Even when his father tried to give him a nudge, but he resisted.

WATTERS: What a showboat.

GUILFOYLE: What a cutie! Like, 5 million times viewed. Do it again.

Juan.

WILLIAMS: I loved it. Your favorite show, "The Five," has been on the air for six years. So imagine. Imagine being on the air for 29 straight years.

Watch who just broke that record.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can't let you break my record.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: Yes, "The Simpsons." Now the longest running scripted TV show in American history, outgunning, as you just saw, "Gunsmoke," which previously held the record. It started in 1989. "The Simpsons" has had 636 episodes and made Homer, Marge, Bart, and Lisa, and Maggie, as well as my favorite, doughnuts, into a favorite of every kid, big and small. Even Jesse, you like that show.

WATTERS: I do love that show.

PERINO: Love it.

GUILFOYLE: That's wonderful. All right. Well, that was a good one. Fantastic. Excellent choices.

Greg.

GUTFELD: Time for --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GRAPHIC: Greg's Birds Rising Up to Take Over the World News

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUTFELD: "Greg's Birds Rising Up to Take Over the World News." It was only a matter of time before they got tired of humans, as if we're little meat robots to shoot them out of the sky.

Birds are now fighting back. Let's go to Malibu, California, No. 1. This a graduation at Pepperdine. The pelicans have had enough. The pelicans said, "Screw you, students. We're the real winners here." Look at this. They actually -- did you know that 40 people died. Of embarrassment. All right.

PERINO: That poor guy.

GUTFELD: Let's go to the next one. Quickly, we don't have time. Here is a giant inflatable duck that people believe is empty, but filled with thousands of murderous ducks that escaped a charity event in Des Moines, Iowa, after breaking free of its tethers. Run little ducky. Run, be free. It's just like "Westworld."

GUILFOYLE: Oh, we know about that. "Westworld." Wild rush (ph).

OK, Dana Perino.

PERINO: I have one that's very educational and helpful to all of you at home.

GUTFELD: Boo.

PERINO: Who might be looking for a job or moving somewhere, whatever. There is a labor shortage in the United States. There's a 4.1 percent unemployment rate that's a 17-year low. So we've been talking about the economy. This is an amazing thing. Cities across the United States are trying to combat the problem of not having enough workers by trying to lure you there. They are offering cash. They're going to pay off your student loans. You can get, like, free rent for, like, three months. All sorts of stuff is happening. This was in The Wall Street Journal today, so check it out.

Two places we mentioned: Hamilton, Ohio, promises $5,000 to help pay student loans. Grant County, Indiana, will get $5,000 towards buying a home. In summer climates, a modern-day Homestead Act.

Jesse, this is very helpful for people who want to find a job.

WATTERS: You turned down the rat for that?

PERINO: I turned down the stupid Pizza Rat.

GUILFOYLE: All right. Set your DVRs. Never miss an episode of "The Five." "Special Report" up next, live from Morgantown, West Virginia, tonight -- Bret.

BAIER: Hey, Kimberly. Thank you.

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