Stephen Colbert’s Melania doppelgänger returned to the show in a brutal re-enactment of the first lady’s speech denying ties to disgraced pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
“Last week, I held an extremely WTF press conference where I explained that I never spent any time with Jeffrey Epstein, except for all the time I spent with Jeffrey Epstein,” Laura Benanti’s version of Melania Trump began on The Late Show sketch.
Benanti, who has previously taken on the role of Melania for the show, appeared at a fake White House podium, looking uncannily like the first lady, complete with blond, blow-dried locks and a gray suit.
“I gave my speech for many reasons,” the Melania lookalike continued. “Most importantly, talking about Jeffrey Epstein distracts people from the war that was started to distract people from talking about Jeffrey Epstein.”
The three-minute sketch featured Benanti making several false claims, mocking the first lady for her surprise address at every turn.
“I would like to make the following announcements,” Benanti said. “Just as I rarely hung out with Jeffrey Epstein, I rarely cooked with Jeffrey Dahmer.”
“We just had overlapping social circles in Milwaukee,” she said definitively, nodding to the first lady’s insistence that she and her husband only encountered Epstein because of New York and Palm Beach’s connected social circles and attending “the same parties as Epstein from time to time.”
Benanti then moved on to stress that she is “not a clone of Melania that was created to appear in public with my husband.”
Lastly, she said, “Last, I want to put the rumors of marital trouble to rest by saying I live at the White House and I am absolutely in love with my house.” The comedian then feigned disgust, nearly throwing up, as she tried to say, “I am in love with my husband.”
A White House spokesman responded to the sketch by slamming Colbert.
“Stephen Colbert is a pathetic trainwreck with no talent and terrible ratings,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told the Daily Beast, “Which is exactly why CBS canceled his show and is booting him off the airwaves.”
In the first lady’s bombshell address last week, she vehemently denied being one of Epstein’s victims, having been on his plane, or ever visiting his private island.
“The lies linking me with the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein need to end today,” Melania, who married Trump in 2005, began her statement. “I have never been friends with Epstein,” she continued, adding that she and the president sometimes encountered him because of overlapping social circles.
She also called on Congress to facilitate a public hearing for Epstein survivors.
Melania brushed off a 2002 email between her and Ghislaine Maxwell, calling it “casual correspondence.”
Melania also denied rumors that she was a victim of Epstein, who died in prison in 2019, or that he introduced her to Trump.
Melania’s statement about Epstein came seemingly unprompted, sparking debate about both the timing and motivation.
