FUNNY PAGES | ‘I’m Glad It’s Funny To You’
Late-night hosts skewer Trump’s threat to jail them all if he’s elected
Editor’s Note: “The Funny Pages” is our occasional look at the intersection of late-night TV comedians with the politics and issues of our day.
Sometimes late-night hosts excel when delving into gallows humor. And other times, they are at their funniest when they make themselves the punchline to their jokes.
Monday was a chance to bring those together as the comedians of late-night TV bantered about the threat Donald Trump made to jail them should he be elected again as president this fall.
The former president made threats recently on social media to imprison anyone who he deems an opponent. And he asked Justice Department officials to go after the long-running comedy series Saturday Night Live when he was in the White House because the program would satirize him.
“Maybe the weirdest story about Trump this month involves me,” ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel remarked. “Rolling Stone published a story today, the topic was what could happen if Trump wins, and one of the things is this. They wrote, ‘There’s no nemesis too small. The tally even includes late-night comics who’ve pissed him off. As president, Trump briefly attempted to get justice officials to twist campaign finance laws and the federal equal-time rule to declare that anti-Trump material broadcast by Saturday Night Live, Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert and others was somehow illegal.
“‘During his 2024 campaign, which is now, according to a source with direct knowledge, Trump has raised this topic again, venting about the need to punish late-night comedians for giving ‘illegal’ campaign contributions to the Democratic Party in the form of jokes and on-air satire,’” he said, before turning to the audience and cracking, “Well, I’m glad it’s funny to you.”
On his program on CBS, Colbert seemed to revel in the news of his potential incarceration.
“Yes! Thank you! Finally! I made an enemies list!” he exclaimed. “I mean, obviously, there’s no guarantee I’ll be arrested, but it’s an honor just to be nominated. No doubt it’ll all be decided this weekend in Los Angeles.
“Whoever wins the Emmy for best talk show will be sent to a camp. ‘And the gulag goes to...’ So, to my old colleague Jon Stewart, I just want you to know I voted for you,” Colbert quipped.
In fact, both Kimmel and Colbert good-naturedly joked about Stewart his current arrangement of hosting The Daily Show only on Mondays.
“How would this work for Jon Stewart? Would he only go to jail on Mondays? There’s a lot to figure out. I’m now imagining me and all the other late-night hosts in prison together, like the mobsters in Goodfellas,” Kimmel joked. “I’ll be stirring the sauce, Colbert is slicing the garlic with a razor blade.
“Guillermo, you’re probably going in too,” he joked to his sidekick. “Bring some sausage, because we’re going to have some time on our hands.”
Meanwhile, Colbert simply quipped, “Of course, if Jon wins, he’s only incarcerated on Mondays.”
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