CNN’s Brooke Baldwin knew pretty early on in this interview that she had no chance of baiting NFL great Jim Brown into bashing Trump. 

“I fell in love with him [Trump] because he really talks about helping African-American black people, and that’s why I’m here.”

Gotta give the man his due. Donald Trump may be the only person alive equally capable of charming Kanye West, Jim Brown, and Mitt Romney. However you may feel about his shtick on the stump, the guy must have a genius-level quotient of personal charisma in private conversation when he feels like summoning it. I wonder how it’ll translate in diplomatic meetings, with leaders from other cultures. It’s hard to imagine Trump and Merkel hitting it off in the same way it’s hard to imagine Merkel hitting it off with, say, Don King, but nothing would surprise me anymore. Brown sounds like he’s ready to sign up for the reelection campaign here. –HA

“When he goes through what he went through to become the President, he’s got my admiration. Because no one game him a chance. You know they called him names. Ahh…people that called him names when he won, he reached back and brought them along with him. He held no grudges.”