Jon Stewart on Ron DeSantis Shipping Migrants to Martha’s Vineyard: ‘The Path to Republican Power Lies In Dickishness’

Jon Stewart took aim at Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) over his plan to “own the libs” by moving immigrants from the “Sunshine State” to Martha’s Vineyard.

In a clip uploaded to Stewart’s YouTube page, The Problem with Jon Stewart, he chatted with writers Jay Jurden and Tocarra Mallard about the latest developments with the migrants.

“I don’t wanna make this racial again, but the — but the country has a history of putting nonwhite people on vessels and going, ‘Yeah. Yeah. It’ll be fun when you get wherever you’re headed,'” Jurden said poking fun at DeSantis who utilized a charter plane to ship 50 migrants to Massachusetts last week.

“Oh my God. Yes. This all started with slave labor. Turn with me to your textbooks,” Mallard added jokingly.

“That was not allowed to be taught at my school. So I don’t even know what you’re talking about. If that’s that CRT, I don’t want any part of it,” Stewart joked back.

“Well, it’s very obvious at this point that the path to Republican power lies in dickishness,” he added. “I don’t know that there is a political platform or an ideology other than dickishness and, you know, this stunt did exactly what he wanted it to do, which is jumped his profile, made him a hero amongst those, for whom dickishness is one of the sole characteristics that they’re looking for in their leaders.”

“It probably angered Trump because ‘Nobody’s gonna be a bigger dick than me.’ Like this is going to be — imagine the season that we’re in where they are trying to one-up each other in utter cruelty. And that’s going to be the thing. And this country does a shitty job of taking care of the people that are already here,” Stewart added.

Stewart called for immigration reform that didn’t involve the demonization of people and groups.

“So there is a much larger issue here of cooperation and consideration. Clearly though, can’t we have a sane immigration policy that doesn’t rely on the demonization? Like, is that really beyond our grasp,” he said.

“And the kind of subterfuge and the coercion aspect of it,” Jurden added. “If you are actively coercing people, then you’ve put yourself in legal peril, you have this dishonest system. So you’re taking advantage of something that’s already broken instead of trying to fix it. That’s the weird part.”

“Cause what, Jay? What’s easier? Is it easier to govern and solve problems or is it easier to meme?” Stewart said referring to the formation of viral internet jokes.

“It’s easier to meme,” Mallard responded. “Jay made a great point. It’s the meme-ification of politics. I mean, they gave Fox News the heads up, but didn’t notify any local officials. So talk to me about that.”

“Because they don’t give a fuck,” Stewart said. “This is about their brand.”

He concluded, “The brand is this — what’s the brand now about? Their brand is to — they found groups of people that they can demonize and that their base gets excited about. And so it’s all about finding a way to amplify their brand at the expense of real people and real problems that are solvable.”

Listen above via The Problem with Jon Stewart.

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