At the start of Wednesday’s episode of The Late Show, Stephen Colbert somberly confessed to doing “not great.” In the aftermath of Republican candidate and convicted felon Donald Trump being elected for the second time as president, every late-night TV show addressed the outcome, and attempted to find humor in a painful time for millions of Americans.
“Some people said to me, ‘Sorry you have to do a show tonight,’ which is nice of them to say. But I don’t have to do a show. I get to do a show tonight,” Colbert continued during his monologue. “I’m so grateful to be with all these talented people.” He also noted that no one enters the comedy business “because their life worked out great,” adding, “We’re built for rough roads.”
His sentiment echoes that of Colbert’s former boss, Jon Stewart, who hosted a live episode of The Daily Show during election night, which Vanity Fair attended. “This is not the end,” he told his viewers. “And we have to regroup, and we have to continue to fight and continue to work, day in and day out, to create the better society—for our children, for this world, for this country—that we know is possible. It’s possible.”
Here’s what TV’s other late-night hosts had to say about a second Trump term.
Stephen Colbert
“Well, fuck, it happened again,” Colbert said during Wednesday’s episode. “After a bizarre and vicious campaign fueled by a desperate need not to go to jail, Donald Trump has won the 2024 election.”
The Late Show host acknowledged that while “the deep shock and sense of loss is enormous,” there is a silver lining to be found in the fact that “there’ll be a peaceful transfer of power.” Colbert continued, “All day yesterday, I was walking around proudly wearing my ‘I Voted’ sticker. Today I wore my, ‘I am questioning my fundamental belief in the goodness of humanity’ sticker.”
He also dispelled the notion that comedians are chomping at the bit to joke about Trump for another four years. “Now, as a late-night host, people often say to me, ‘Come on, part of you has got to want Trump to win because he gives you so much material to work with,’” Colbert said. “No, no. No one tells the guy who cleans the bathroom: ‘Wow, you must love it when someone has explosive diarrhea. There’s so much material for you to work with.’”
Desi Lydic
With Stewart broadcasting live during the election results on Tuesday, senior correspondent Lydic was tasked with addressing the “waking nightmare” of Trump’s victory. “America elected its first criminal president before electing its first female president,” she stated plainly, adding that “instead of breaking the glass ceiling, last night America decided to get back with her dirtbag ex.”
Lydic later turned an eye toward the millions of voters who cast their ballots in support of Trump 2.0. “He’s a dictator. He’s a fascist. He’s a malignant narcissist whose blood type is fryer oil,” she said. “But it’s pretty clear that America is the one that needs the diagnosis.”
Jimmy Fallon
Fallon also compared Trump’s second term to people reconciling with “their crazy ex.” He also said that “Trump returning to the White House is a huge historic comeback for someone who literally never went away,” and attempted to unite both sides of the aisle by quipping, “No matter who you voted for, we can all agree: It’s gonna be a rough Thanksgiving.”
Seth Meyers
Meyers likened the experience of watching the election results to “Christmas Eve, if you know on Christmas morning, you’re either going to wake up to find that Santa left presents under the tree or to find that Santa just took a huge dump in your fireplace.”
The Late Show host confirmed that he had voted for Kamala Harris, adding, “I don’t think Donald Trump is a good person. I’d even go so far as to say he’s a bad person. Now, in my defense, I’m only basing that on everything I’ve ever been taught about what makes someone good or bad.” Meyers continued, “But this is real, and this is something I accept: Half the country thinks he’s a good person, or they don’t care that he’s not because they think he’s a good president, and because of that, he’s going to be our president. Again, that’s how democracy works in America, a country that is a privilege to live in, even on a morning like today.”
Meyers then expressed his gratitude for a platform like his NBC series during a time of tumult. This is a joyful place to work,” he said. “We’re not going to let anything take that joy away, even when we’re not talking about things that are not particularly joyful,” declaring that his team’s motto would be: “Let’s fucking go.”
Taylor Tomlinson
On After Midnight, which seized the time slot previously occupied by James Corden’s The Late Show earlier this year, Tomlinson declared: “It’s an honor to be on television while women are still allowed to be.” She joked about “rewatching Game of Thrones to calm down” on election night and “just desperately trying to get myself back to 2011,” when Joe Rogan “wasn’t helping people decide elections. He was just helping people decide if they were gonna eat bugs for money.”
Jimmy Kimmel
Kimmel grew emotional when addressing his audience post-election. “We had the choice between a prosecutor and a criminal, and we chose the criminal to be the president of the United States,” he said, noting that he himself was on Trump’s list of enemies. On that note, Kimmel joked, “My only request to President-elect Trump is that he let me share a prison cell with Taylor Swift.”
The Jimmy Kimmel Live! host continued through tears, “It was a terrible night for women, for children, for the hundreds of thousands of hard-working immigrants who make this country go. For health care, for our climate, for scientists, for journalists, for justice, for free speech. It was a terrible night for poor people, for the middle class, for seniors who rely on Social Security, for our allies in Ukraine, for NATO and democracy and decency.” He added: “It was a terrible night for everyone who voted against him and guess what? It was a bad night for everyone who voted for him, too, you just don’t realize it yet.”
Kimmel then noted everyone it was a “really good night for,” including Vladimir Putin, polio, and “lovable billionaires like Elon Musk and the bros up in Silicon Valley and all the wriggling brain worms who sold what was left of their souls to bow down to Donald Trump.”
The one bright spot Kimmel could find amid impending darkness was this: “Maybe we will look back and realize that in the long run, this is what we needed to wake us up. Maybe the people who care so much about him need to find out how little he cares about them.”
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