Seth Meyers Fires Back After Trump Fumes His Comedy Is ‘PROBABLY ILLEGAL’
Seth Meyers used his NBC show to push back against President Donald Trump on Monday night, after the president claimed on Truth Social that Meyers’ comedy was “PROBABLY ILLEGAL!!!”
Trump attacked the host on Saturday, insisting the comedian “may be the WORST to perform, live or otherwise,” and complaining that Meyers’ act is now “100% ANTI-TRUMP” which he added was “PROBABLY ILLEGAL!!!”
Meyers opened his response, however, by focusing on Trump’s claim that he talks “endlessly about electric catapults on aircraft carriers.” The host insisted that fixation was Trump’s alone, to laughter from the audience, before running a slew of clips of the president talking about catapults on aircraft carriers.
“Until you said something, I didn’t even know aircraft carriers had catapults!” he said to Trump.
He then took his time deconstructing the president’s post, going line by line at the contradictions. The anchor noted Trump’s assertion in his post from the weekend that he hadn’t watched Meyers in years, only to point out Trump’s gripe about being briefly “stuck watching Marble Mouth Meyers” 10 months ago.
“‘Stuck?'” Meyers paused. “I find it hard to believe you let other people decide what to put on. Everything about your vibe screams, ‘I call the clicker!'”
The late-night host then went directly to the First Amendment, returning fire with the very words Trump had used to suggest illegality.
“That is your First Amendment right, which I have too, right? We all have it, right?” he asked.
He continued: “I say this with sincerity, people don’t want to talk about catapults. I don’t want to talk about [White House] bathrooms. And I’m realizing that I’m starting to sound like a deranged lunatic. But that’s what you do to us. You make us talk about what you’re talking about, and then we all sound crazy.”
He ended the segment framing Trump’s social media fixation as theater and distraction: “What we should be talking about instead is the government shutdown you’re not solving or the food assistance you refuse to fund. Working families are struggling while you renovate your bathroom and you build your ballroom, and that’s why your approval ratings are in the toilet.”
Trump has repeatedly attacked late-night comedians, celebrating the cancellation of Stephen Colbert’s Late Show by CBS, as well as ABC’s temporary suspension of Jimmy Kimmel’s show in September after regulatory pressure from a Trump-appointed FCC chairman.
Watch above via NBC.
