Jon Stewart has weighed in on President Donald Trump’s speech flop at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Friday.
Trump’s hour-long speech at the Waldorf Astoria on Friday failed to amuse most of the journalists in the audience. A CNN panel after the event trashed Trump’s performance, with even the panel’s Republican pundits failing to offer much of a defense for the president.
Trump’s most controversial remarks at the event centered around CNN journalist Kaitlan Collins. Repeating a comment he’s made to Collins multiple times, Trump berated her for not smiling enough, and then claimed to have confused Collins with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
Stewart ripped into Trump on Monday for his seemingly nonexistent comedic chops, joking that the only funny thing about Trump’s attack on Collins was Wolf Blitzer’s reaction.
“Wolf Blitzer kept looking over like, ‘You want me to f--- him up? I’ll go f--- him up,” Stewart said.
Stewart argued that Trump’s joke delivery was so rambling and awkward because he’s been surrounded for years by people who laugh at every bad joke he makes.
“He has lived so long in a magical world of his own creation, curated for his comfort and positive reinforcement,” Stewart said. “He’s the ultimate snowflake, rewarded with unearned participation trophy laughs.”
“He doesn’t even know what’s actually funny,” Stewart said, “because everything he says is funny in his Truman Show of an administration.”
Trump’s performance even disappointed conservative pundit Scott Jennings, a man who has staunchly defended Trump’s war in Iran and dismissed Trump’s apparent connections to Jeffrey Epstein.
“Some of the jokes landed, and some of the jokes didn’t,” Jennings said on Friday night. He added that most of Trump’s speech “veered off into very, sort of ornery insults, and that’s not going to land for many audiences.”
Stewart found Jennings’ response to be a scathing indication of how poorly Trump’s speech went over.
“That guy couldn’t polish this turd?" Stewart said incredulously. “Even he’s like, ‘I can’t put lipstick on this motherf---er!’"
