Jon Stewart united with his late night comrades in show of solidarity with Jimmy Kimmel as the Daily Show host delivered a satirical ‘administration compliant’ show.
The talk show comedians spoke nearly in unison on Thursday night as they complained about the Trump administration’s supposed ‘censorship’ of their television domain – which has been notoriously critical of the president.
Stewart returned for an unscheduled appearance on The Daily Show just one day after Jimmy Kimmel Live! was suspended indefinitely due to remarks he made about Charlie Kirk’s death.
He began Thursday night’s episode by promising a ‘fun, hilarious administration-compliant’ program.
‘Our great administration has laid out very clear rules on free speech,’ Stewart said sardonically.
‘Now some naysayers may argue that this administration’s speech concerns are merely a cynical ploy. A thin gruel of a ruse. A smoke screen to obscure an unprecedented consolidation of power and unitarian intimidation and coldly antithetical to any experiment in a constitutional Republic governance.
‘Some people would say that. Not me, though. I think it’s great.’
The Daily Show set was refashioned with decorative gold engravings, in a parody of gold accents Trump has added to the fireplace, doorway arches, walls and other areas of the Oval Office.
Stewart fidgeted nervously as though he was worried about speaking the correct talking points. When the audience members reacted with an ‘awww’ he whispered: ‘What are you doing? Shut up. You’re going to f***ing blow this for us.’
He took on a more stilted tone when he started describing Trump’s visit to the United Kingdom, calling the president ‘our great father.’
‘Gaze upon him. With a gait even more majestic than that of the royal horses that prance before him,’ he said.
Stewart normally only appears on Monday nights, but made an exception to film another episode this week in the wake of Kimmel’s axing.
He is the latest in a string of talk show hosts to address Kimmel’s shock dressing down this week.
Fallon opened his ‘Tonight Show’ monologue by admitting he has no idea what is going to happen moving forward.
‘To be honest with you all, I don’t know what’s going on. And no one does,’ he said. ‘But I do know Jimmy Kimmel, and he’s a decent, funny and loving guy, and I hope he comes back.’
Fallon went on to deliver his monologue ‘just like I normally would,’ but with the punchlines of his jokes about Trump replaced by an announcer who made them inoffensive.
‘President Trump just wrapped up his three day trip to the UK, and he looked incredibly handsome,’ he began.
‘His tie was exactly the right length and his face looked like a color that exists in nature, and his hair looked better than Conrad’s from The Summer I Turned Pretty.’
‘Anyway, to sum it up, President Trump is making America great again by restoring our national reputation, reinvigorating our economy and rebuilding our military. I hereby nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize,’ he added.
‘See, we can still say what we want.’
Speaking off-air during an audience question-and-answer session, Fallon also revealed that he had texted Kimmel after he heard the shocking news.
Stephen Colbert, whose show has already been cancelled, took a vastly different approach, instead choosing to blast Trump in a defiant defense of Kimmel.
‘This is blatant censorship,’ Colbert said of Kimmel’s ouster at the taping for the show, which is set to air later Thursday night.
He then blasted Trump as an ‘autocrat’ saying ‘you cannot give [him] an inch. Jimmy, I stand with you and your staff 100 percent.
‘Tonight, we are all Jimmy Kimmel.’
He also said that despite his own cancellation at CBS, the network which airs The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ‘wouldn’t have done this.
‘Now, regardless of what you think, what has already been done and how that looks, this is weak.’
Colbert was fired in July after he criticized CBS’ parent company, Paramount, for settling a lawsuit with President Trump for $16 million amid a major merger between the company and Skydance.
He argued on his show that the settlement was a ‘big, fat, bribe’ to the Trump administration to approve the merger.
But Paramount executives announced at the time his show would be continuing through the end of the broadcast season.
In contrast, ABC announced Wednesday that it was suspending Kimmel’s show ‘indefinitely’ following his controversial remarks about the man accused of shooting conservative commentator Kirk.
Kimmel had claimed that Tyler Robinson, 22, was a right-wing member of the MAGA movement.
Investigators have said became radicalized with far-left ideologies and was dating his transgender roommate. Robinson was raised in a Republican household.
Seth Meyers, the host of NBC’s Late Night with Seth Meyers, also waded into the Kimmel controversy on Thursday night, opting to take a similar approach to Stewart.
‘His administration is pursuing a crackdown on free speech,’ the comedian said to open his show.
‘And completely unrelated, I just want to say, before we get started here, that I’ve always admired and respected Mr. Trump,’ he continued, provoking the audience to raucous laughter.
‘I’ve always believed he was a visionary, innovator, a great president , an even better golfer. And if you’ve ever seen me saying anything negative about him, that’s just AI.
He then took a more serious note as he spoke about Kimmel’s sudden ouster.
‘It is a privilege and an honor to call Jimmy Kimmel my friend, in the same way that it’s a privilege and honor to do this show every night,’ Meyers said.
‘I wake up every day, I count my blessings that I live in a country that at least purports to value freedom of speech, and we’re gonna keep doing our show the way we’ve always done it: with enthusiasm and integrity,’ he vowed.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr said he was considering an investigation into Kimmel and ABC over the remarks.
‘When you look at the conduct that has taken place by Jimmy Kimmel, it appears to be some of the sickest conduct possible,’ Carr told conservative podcaster Benny Johnson hours before Kimmel’s ouster was revealed.
The cancelation was quickly praised by President Trump, who called it ‘great news for America.’
He also praised ABC for ‘finally having the courage to do what had to be done’ as he called for executives at NBC to also oust Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers.
‘Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done,’ he wrote on his Truth Social platform. ‘Kimmel has ZERO talent and worse ratings than even Colbert, if that’s possible.’
‘That leaves Jimmy [Fallon] and Seth [Meyers], two total losers on Fake News NBC,’ the president continued.
‘Their ratings are also horrible,’ he said. ‘Do it NBC!!!’
