Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel Fire Back at Trump for Late-Night Attacks
The late-night hosts went off on the president for tweeting about their ratings and complaining about their jokes during the pandemic.
CBS/ABC
Among the many tweets President Donald Trump posted in the middle of his “work day” on Tuesday was a congratulatory message to Fox News host Greg Gutfeld, a “one time Trump Hater who has come all the way home.”
“His Ratings easily beat no talent Stephen Colbert, nice guy Jimmy Fallon, and wacko ‘last placer’ Jimmy Kimmel,” Trump tweeted. “Greg built his show from scratch, and did a great job in doing so.”
The president neglected to mention that unlike the nightly late-night shows on CBS, NBC and ABC, The Greg Gutfeld Show airs just once a week on Saturday nights. With an average 2.86 million viewers in April, he did just barely edge out late-night frontrunner Colbert’s 2.78 million for The Late Show. But he’s far from their direct competition.
In response, Kimmel tweeted, “Happy Cinco de Mayo Mr. President! Thanks for the shout-out - now get back to work royally fucking everything up!” But he had a lot more to say on his latest show from home.
“I hope he wasn’t talking about me!” Kimmel joked after reading Trump’s tweet aloud during his monologue Tuesday night. “I think what he meant to tweet was, ‘I am completely devastated by the loss of life caused by this insidious virus. My thoughts are with the families of those who have passed. I pledge to spend every waking moment working to make sure our medical workers have the support they need and every American has access to tests. P.S. Congrats to Greg Gutfeld!’”
“That’s better, right?” the host asked. “He does seem to be familiar with all the late-night shows. I’ve heard that if you snort enough Adderall, you can watch four of them at once.”
In addition to his tweet about the late-night ratings, Trump also complained about the hosts during an interview with the New York Post this week. Explaining why he’s unlikely to attend the White House Correspondents’ Dinner yet again this year, the president ranted, “How do these guys get jobs? I don’t get it. How does a Seth Meyers, how does [Stephen] Colbert — has no talent, there’s nothing funny about him, nothing funny. You look at some of these people and you say, ‘How do they get a job?’”
“It’s nice to know that Trump is staying laser-focused on the ball during a crisis,” Colbert shot back. “I can’t speak for Seth. He’s very talented. But I am an idiot. The only reason I have this job is because I married the daughter of Donald CBS and for some reason, he keeps putting me in charge of everything.”
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