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      The high life: Kamala Harris cracks open a beer with Stephen Colbert

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      When they go low, she goes high. Miller High Life to be precise.Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, took her election campaign to late night television on Tuesday by cracking open a can of the lager with host Stephen Colbert. The moment set her apart from Joe Biden and Donald Trump – both, famously, teetotallers.The vice-president also used the interview in New York’s Ed Sullivan Theater to lambast Trump over a report that he sent Covid testing kits to Russia’s Vladimir Putin even as US citizens went without. “He thinks, well, that’s his friend,” she said. “What about the American people? They should be your first friend.”The appearance before a live audience capped a media blitz for Harris who, having previously been criticised for dodging interviews, spoke in recent days to CBS’s 60 Minutes, the podcast Call Her Daddy, the daytime show The View and radio host Howard Stern.The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has featured Harris, Biden and numerous other politicians over the years, blending serious political issues with light relief. During Tuesday’s interview in New York, he noted that people are calling this “the vibe election” and that voters typically want a candidate they can have a beer with.He duly invited Harris to share a drink and said she had requested Miller High Life in advance. The vice-president remarked: “OK, the last time I had beer was at a baseball game with Doug. Cheers.”Harris repeated the popular slogan “The champagne of beers”, while Colbert noted that it comes from Milwaukee, in the swing state of Wisconsin. He said: “So that covers Wisconsin. Let’s talk Michigan. Let’s appeal to the Michigan voters, OK? What are your favourite Bob Seger songs?”The host proceeded to reel off a list of Seger songs but Harris did not appear enthusiastic. Finally, she said: “I’ll go Aretha or Eminem. You got any?”The 40-minute interview, due to be broadcast on CBS on Tuesday night, also tackled serious topics. Colbert asked about the 7 October attack by Hamas and Israel’s response. Harris said: “We must have a ceasefire and hostage deal as immediately as possible. This war has got to end. It has to end.”Progress on a deal for a ceasefire and the release of hostages is “meaningless”, she acknowledged, until it is reached. Harris said she has met with the families of hostages and the families of Palestinians killed in Gaza. “We’ve got to get a deal done and we’re not going to give up.”The interview took place after it emerged that journalist Bob Woodward writes in his new book, War, that Trump has had as many as seven private phone calls with Putin since leaving office and secretly sent the Russian president Covid test machines in 2020. Trump has denied the claims.Harris commented: “He openly admires dictators and authoritarians. He has said he wants to be a dictator on day one if he were elected again as president. He gets played by these guys. He admires so-called strongmen and he gets played because they flatter him or offer him favour.”Referring to the Covid test kits, she went on: “I ask everyone here and everyone who is watching: do you remember what those days were like? You remember how many people did not have tests and were trying to scramble to get them?”Harris became visibly irate as she recalled that hundreds of people were dying every day, some comforted only by nurses because their families could not reach them.
      “And this man is giving Covid test kits to Vladimir Putin? Think about what this means on top of him sending love letters to Kim Jong-un. He thinks, well, that’s his friend. What about the American people? They should be your first friend.”Earlier Colbert asked Harris about a now celebrated image of her in the presidential debate against Trump in which she frowned and rested her chin on a hand. Asked what she was thinking at that moment, she replied: “It’s family TV, right? It starts with a W, there’s a letter between it, then the last letter’s F.” She burst into laughter.The comedian asked if Trump lost the 2020 election, something he has always denied. Harris said: “You know, when you lost millions of jobs, you lost manufacturing, you lost automotive plants, you lost the election. What does that make you? A loser. This is what somebody at my rallies said. I thought it was funny.”She laughed and Colbert remarked: “It’s accurate. It’s accurate.”Then Harris pointed out: “This is what happens when I drink beer!” More

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      Harris embarks on media blitz and tries to edge out Trump in key swing states

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      Kamala Harris has embarked on a week-long media blitz, hurtling from TV studios and late-night shows to podcast interviews as she seeks to gain an edge over Donald Trump in the US election’s key battleground states that remain nail-bitingly close.The vice-president’s decision to face a raft of largely friendly media outlets came as the campaigns entered the final 30 days. More than 1.4 million Americans have already cast their ballots in early voting across 30 states.The Democratic nominee’s whirlwind media tour has been carefully crafted for maximum reach and minimum risk. Harris has talked to the CBS News show 60 Minutes, along with the popular podcast Call Her Daddy.On Tuesday she hits the media capital, New York, for appearances on ABC News’s daytime behemoth The View and the Howard Stern Show, followed by a recording with late-night host Stephen Colbert.The first of a flurry of comments from Harris was put out by 60 Minutes on Sunday before a full broadcast on Monday. Harris will appear alone, after Trump declined to be interviewed by the election special which has been a staple of US election coverage for more than half a century.In a short clip released by 60 Minutes, Harris was asked whether the Biden-Harris administration had any sway over the actions of Benjamin Netanyahu, the hardline prime minister of Israel who appears not to listen to Washington. Asked whether the US had a “real close ally” in Netanyahu, she replied: “With all due respect, the better question is: do we have an important alliance between the American people and the Israeli people? And the answer to that question is yes.”Since Harris’s meteoric propulsion as Democratic presidential nominee after Joe Biden stepped aside, her relative avoidance of press or TV interviews has become a point of contention on the campaign trail. Republican leaders and pundits on Fox News routinely accuse her of being media-shy.This week’s blitz is designed to counter that impression, while reaching large audiences focused on demographic groups which will be central to Harris’s chances of winning in November. Call Her Daddy is Spotify’s most-listened to podcast among women, while The View is the number one ranked daytime talk show with 2.5 million average viewers, again heavily weighted towards women.Meanwhile Colbert’s show on CBS is the highest rated late-night talk show attracting large numbers of younger viewers aged 18 to 49 – another critical demographic on Harris’s target list.Harris’s running mate, the Democratic governor of Minnesota Tim Walz, is also making his own media scramble which began on Sunday, with him entering less comfortable territory on Fox News Sunday. He was questioned about the pro-abortion law that he signed in his state, and also asked to clarify the occasions on which he has misrepresented his record.That included a comment that he had carried weapons in war when he had not, and his classifying the treatment that he and his wife received to have a child as IVF when it was in fact a different type of fertility treatment.At last week’s vice-presidential debate Walz recognised his missteps, calling himself a “knucklehead”.Walz told Fox News Sunday: “To be honest with you, I don’t think American people care whether I used IUI or IVF, what they understand is that Donald Trump would resist these things. I speak passionately … I will own up when I misspeak and when I make a mistake.”As the contest enters its final month, the Guardian’s latest tracker of opinion polls shows Harris up on Trump by three percentage points nationally. In the more telling test of the seven battleground states that will decide the outcome, though Harris is ahead in five of them, the margin remains essentially too close to call.Both candidates and their running mates are speeding up their frantic dash around the seven states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Harris and Walz will be in Arizona this weeks, where early voting begins on Wednesday.On Thursday, the Democratic ticket will gain extra ballast when former president and campaigning superstar Barack Obama kicks off a round of stump appearances in the all-important swing state, Pennsylvania. He will begin in Pittsburgh, and will then travel across the country on Harris’s behalf, campaign aides have said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump was scheduled to hold a rally in Juneau, Wisconsin, on Sunday afternoon, a day after he made a pointed return to the fairgrounds in Butler, Pennsylvania, where he came close to being assassinated on 13 July. Trump and his younger son Eric used the occasion to spread the baseless claim that the Democrats had been behind the attempt on his life.“They tried to kill him, it’s because the Democratic party can’t do anything right,” Eric Trump said. Billionaire Elon Musk also appeared on stage.On Sunday, Mike Johnson, the Republican speaker of the US House, was asked by ABC News’s This Week whether such comments were responsible amid mounting fears of political violence in the build up to the 5 November election. Johnson sidestepped the question, saying he had not heard the full speeches.The speaker also notably refused to answer whether Trump had lost the 2020 election, in the wake of Trump’s ongoing lies that he was the actual victor. “This is the game that is always played by the media with leading Republicans, it’s a gotcha game, and I’m not going to engage in it,” Johnson said.The former president’s wife, Melania Trump, sat down for an interview with the Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. She was asked given how close her husband had come to being shot in Butler whether she trusted the top officials of the FBI, CIA and other federal agencies who “appeared to be against President Trump and yourself from day one”.Melania Trump replied: “It’s hard to say who you really trust. You want to, but it’s always a question mark.”Melania Trump, who is promoting her book, Melania, also spoke about her pro-abortion stance which she revealed in the volume. She said her husband had always known her convictions.“He knew my position and my beliefs since the day we met, and I believe in individual freedom. I want to decide what I want to do with my body. I don’t want government in my personal business,” she said. More

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      Stephen Colbert on report on Trump’s attempts to steal election: ‘Smells like consequences’

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      Late-night hosts talk Jack Smith’s new report on how Donald Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election and Republican hypocrisy over Joe Biden’s age.Stephen ColbertBack in July, the supreme court released a 6-3 decision declaring that Trump had immunity from prosecution on acts committed as president, “all but guaranteeing that the case would be delayed past the election, and no one would be talking about or learning any more about it”, said Stephen Colbert on Thursday’s Late Show.“Well, surprise!” he added, holding a 165-page report by special counsel Jack Smith on Trump’s efforts to steal the election. “Mhmmm, that’s beefy. Smells like consequences.”The report details efforts by Donald Trump to overturn the 2020 election, and “how they are not covered by that ridiculous immunity ruling”, said Colbert.“We knew stuff in this report already, but it’s still gratifying to read the novelization of the horror movie we all lived through,” he added. According to the report, Trump knew he lost the 2020 election, knowingly pushed false claims of voter fraud and in his bid to hold on to power, “resorted to crimes”.“Pretty damning language, but kinda weird word choice to say Trump ‘resorted’ to crimes,” said Colbert. “That’s like saying ‘With nowhere else to turn, the bear resorted to pooping in the woods.’”“Just to note, ‘resorted to crimes’ should not be confused with ‘crime resort’ – another name for Mar-a-Lago.”Seth MeyersAccording to Republicans, January 6 is ancient history, “which is why a new filing from special counsel Jack Smith in the election subversion case is so damning”, said Seth Meyers on Late Night. “It reminds everyone of what Trump and his allies tried to do, and how brazen they were about it.”According to Smith’s report, Trump was overheard saying to his daughter Ivanka: “It doesn’t matter if you won or lost the election. You still have to fight like hell.”“This is the most damning thing: in private, Trump knew he lost, despite what he was telling his supporters in public,” said Meyers.The report also details how Rudy Giuliani accidentally butt-dialed an NBC reporter, who overheard him discussing his need for cash and trashing the Biden family. “As a favor to Rudy, stop giving this man your phone number,” Meyers laughed. “The only two numbers he should have in his phone are his doctor and a liquor store that delivers.”“Rudy is the first criminal in history who has managed to rat on himself,” he continued. “The FBI doesn’t need to bug him or monitor his calls. They just have to sit around and wait until he accidentally sits on his phone and calls them.”Jimmy KimmelAnd in Los Angeles, Jimmy Kimmel marveled at how Trump is now trying to get out of election fraud charges by claiming that the investigators rigged the election. “The old ‘he who smelt it dealt it’ defense,” said Kimmel.As Trump said in a recent far-right news interview: “The election was rigged. I didn’t rig it. They did.”“He’s actually right about some of that – he didn’t rig the election,” said Kimmel. “He tried to rig the election, and failed to rig the election. He’s rig-noramus, is what he is.”Meanwhile, Trump was “ranting and raving” in Michigan this week on the campaign trail. “If you watch any of his speeches from the last election, from 2020, you’ll see he’s slower,” said Kimmel. “He slurs his words, he repeats the same stories over and over and over again. He’s repeatedly promised to release his medical records and has not.”Which is notable, because Republicans “were very worked up about Joe Biden and how old he was, his energy levels and ability to lead, but even though Trump is only three years younger than Biden, they don’t seem too worried about that anymore”, said Kimmel before a montage of all the GOP Biden criticisms easily applied to Trump’s ravings on the campaign trail. More

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      Seth Meyers on JD Vance’s debate performance: ‘Brazen and shameless’

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      Late-night hosts talk JD Vance’s many lies during the vice-presidential debate and a new special counsel report detailing how Donald Trump tried to steal the 2020 election.Seth MeyersDonald Trump is “a bad liar”, said Seth Meyers on Wednesday’s Late Night, but he chose as his running mate “someone who is much more polished at it”. JD Vance, Ohio senator, is “brazen and shameless, but he’s admittedly very smooth. He’s like a slick used car dealer, and can be very convincing until you remember the car he’s trying to sell you is an AMC Gremlin with raccoons in the engine.”For instance, during the vice-presidential debate on Tuesday evening, Vance claimed that he was not in favor of a national abortion ban, but did support a “minimum national standard”.“That’s a ban,” Meyers corrected. “A ‘minimum national standard’ is just a bullshit way of describing a national abortion ban. It’s like when I go to the coffee shop on my block and they say they sell all-natural, gluten-free breakfast biscuits. That’s a cookie, dude. Except now you’ve guaranteed that my kids won’t stop asking me why they can’t have it.”Vance has said multiple times that he favors a national abortion ban. On a rightwing podcast in 2022, he said: “I certainly would like abortion to be illegal nationally.”“That’s what happens when you say yes to every rightwing podcast in the universe,” said Meyers. “JD Vance is on record contradicting every thing he says now. Politicians used to be worried about being caught on a hot mic. But now they go into every McMansion basement they can find like they’re on a hot mic scavenger hunt.”Vance also refused to say whether Trump lost the 2020 election. When asked point blank by his opponent, Minnesota’s governor, Tim Walz, Vance deflected with: “I’m focused on the future.”“If you ask someone a straightforward question and they say ‘I’m focused on the future’ that’s how you know they’re caught in a lie,” said Meyers. “Vance may have delivered a slick performance last night, but it was just that – a performance.”Stephen Colbert“We are all still struggling to digest last night’s vice-presidential debate – which is surprising, because usually I have no trouble eating two slices of white bread,” joked Stephen Colbert on Wednesday night.The Late Show host described the debate as a “frosty cup of ZzzQuil”, as the two politicians performed civility and appeared to frequently agree with each other.The Atlantic described the debate as “a vision of what American politics could be without the distorting gravitational field generated by Donald Trump”.“I would love that,” said Colbert, “but here’s the thing: Donald Trump hasn’t gone anywhere. He’s still the main character. This is like a scene from It without Pennywise on camera, and everyone is suddenly like, ‘Welp, guess there’s no more scary clowns in Derry. Ooh, free sewer balloon!’”Colbert took particular aim at Vance’s answer to a question on Obamacare, which Trump tried to destroy numerous times: “I think you could make a really good argument that [Trump] salvaged Obamacare, which was doing disastrously until Donald Trump came along.”“That kind of junior high debate team sophistry is exactly the worst kind of behavior that intelligent people use to justify evil,” added Colbert. “You know, when you think about it, it could be argued that Godzilla really spearheaded Tokyo’s urban renewal.”Colbert was also incensed at Vance’s characterization of January 6: “It’s really rich for Democratic leaders to say that Donald Trump is a unique threat to democracy when he peacefully gave over power on January the 20th.”“Yeah, 14 days after his plot to overthrow the election ended in a violent coup that failed,” said Colbert. “That’s like saying to your ex: ‘Barbara, I think it’s rich that you’re calling me psychotically obsessed with our relationship, when I left your and Brad’s wedding peacefully. You’re the one who won’t stop talking about me setting fire to the DJ.’”Jimmy KimmelAnd in Los Angeles, Jimmy Kimmel looked ahead to election day: “We are 34 days away from Trump saying the election was rigged, just as he did four years ago.” Trump’s efforts to overturn the election four years ago are detailed in a new report from special counsel Jack Smith.The judge overseeing the January 6 case in Washington unsealed a 165-page court filing containing a “mountain” of testimony and evidence against Trump. “All the stuff we know happened, we now have in writing,” said Kimmel.The filing lays out “the increasingly desperate ways Trump tried to steal the election”, Kimmel explained. “You know, sometimes I would wonder, does Trump really believe that this election was stolen from him? And the answer is no, he doesn’t. The plan all along was to declare himself the winner even he if wasn’t, which he did. And then when he realized he was going to lose, he made up these claims of fraud.“He called governors and election officials,” he continued. “He hammered Mike Pence. He deliberately spread lies, even though he privately admitted they were crazy lies. He was directly involved in the fake elector scheme. And he stole all the Oreos from the White House snack cabinet.”The report also detailed just how many times Trump pressured Mike Pence to try to decertify the election, though he had no authority to do so. “There were meetings, phone calls, text messages – Pence was basically Trump’s Baby Reindeer,” Kimmel joked. More

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      Veep cast reunites, with special guests, to raise money for Harris

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      As soon as Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential election and threw his support behind Kamala Harris, people immediately started comparing the shocking turn of events to something that would unfold on HBO’s critically acclaimed political satire Veep. At the time, the US vice-president was seen as a Selina Meyers-esque figure, what with her penchant for public awkwardness, clunky turns of phrase and the perception of her as a perpetual also-ran.Since then, things have changed quite a bit, with Harris rising to the occasion and running a highly effective and exciting campaign that has seen her ascend to frontrunner in the race (even if her advantage remains razor-thin).Still, as I wrote in my article from July, her campaign and the Democrats as a whole would be wise to lean into comparisons to Veep. Despite how venal and vain the characters on the show were, the workplace comedy (which wrapped up in 2019) remains as popular and relevant as ever.When you consider this alongside the fact that the majority of the cast, including and especially its star, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, are outspoken liberals, it made all the sense in the world for some Democratic group to try to work with them to raise funds and awareness during this final leg of the campaign.That group ended up being the Wisconsin Democrats. A swing state that is likely to have a big hand in deciding not only who the next president is, but also which party controls the Senate, WisDems put together a live Zoom table read of a classic episode of Veep, featuring the majority of the cast, plus some big-name guest stars, to be livestreamed to the donors, with the money raised going towards presidential, congressional and assembly campaigns across the state.Fellow liberal comic and Veep super-fan Stephen Colbert took on hosting duties. Special guest stars included the Wisconsin senator Tammy Baldwin in her acting debut (not counting her childhood performance in a school production of Finian’s Rainbow), actor and comedian Kumail Nanjiani as a Syrian refugee (“I’m Pakistani, but I can play cat-eating immigrants from all over the world”), Seinfeld co-star Jason Alexander as a pompous feature writer, film-maker Kevin Smith as a reporter, and Larry David – who, in the most fitting turn of events imaginable, spent the first several minutes of the live stream trying to figure out how to work his Zoom – as Selina’s chief hatchet man, Ben Cafferty.View image in fullscreenReprising their roles from the show were actors Diedrich Bader, Nancy Lenehan, Gary Cole, Sam Richardson, Sufe Bradshaw, Timothy Simons, Reid Scott, Matt Walsh, Anna Chlumsky, Tony Hale and, of course, Louis-Dreyfus, while series regulars Clea DuVall and Sarah Sutherland took on other roles, since their characters don’t appear in this ep. (Patton Oswalt, who was also on the show, made a surprise appearance during the post-read Q&A.)The episode chosen was Crate, from season 3, which finds Selina and her cronies campaigning in New Hampshire ahead of the upcoming primaries. Various mishaps involving a pricey photo-op prop, an incriminating cellphone recording and the suicidal first lady, ensue. This episode is regarded as one of the very best in the show’s history, mostly due to one scene: Selina, having just learned that Potus will be resigning from office, effective immediately, shares a joyous freakout alongside her body man/closest confidant, Gary. It’s a bravura performance from both Louis-Dreyfus and Hale, one that probably secured them each an Emmy the following year.(It’s also fitting that this episode should be chosen, given that this intimate scene is immediately followed by Selina betraying Gary, a dynamic that repeats itself in the most devastating moment of the series finale.)For the read-through, the cast slipped back into their roles with ease. Everyone was on point, but Louis-Dreyfus and Hale were extra-dialed in, especially during their big scene. You got goosebumps watching them recreate it 10 years later, over Zoom, while still bringing all of the emotion they did during the actual filming.The guest stars all acquit themselves well, but it should come as no surprise that it was David who got the biggest laughs. While it’s impossible for him not to play himself, his singular delivery proved a perfect fit with Veep’s uber-cynical, profanity-laden screwball dialog.After the reading, we alternated between cast members interviewing a handful of state legislature candidates (with the major focus of the night revolving around abortion rights) and them fielding questions from viewers. Show creator Armando Iannucci joined in for this portion of the event.We got treated to a mini-Seinfeld reunion between Louis-Dreyfus, Alexander and David; Louis-Dreyfus sounded off on her hatred of AI; Smith talked about his favorite scene of the show (Selina accidentally getting high on St John’s wort, naturally); and David went off on a funny tangent about bald men looking better with beards (although he himself would never grow one because comedians can’t be stroking their beards).Someone asked the cast to give their favorite individual lines from the show. Louis-Dreyfus: “Jolly green jizz-face.” Simons: “[You’re] a meme, ma’am.” Walsh: “I’ve met [some] people … and a lot of them are fucking idiots.” Chlumsky: “[That’s] like [trying to use] a croissant [as] a [fucking] dildo. It doesn’t [do] the job and it [makes] a fucking mess!” Bradshaw: “[Get] the government out of my [fucking] snatch.” Colbert: “Danny Wah!”Iannucci seemed to confirm that Kent and Sue indeed hooked up at some point (“It probably involved algorithms”) and speculated on various characters’ outcomes (married politicos Amy and Bill are probably hosting a podcast with their dogs, while the “late” Andrew Meyer is living under a new identity on an island that he’s trying to buy with a view to it being recognized as its own country).When asked about the future of satire, Iannucci said it depended on who wins this election, as the entire premise of political comedy hinges on people holding politicians up to certain standards, standards Trump and his ilk have never shown the least bit of concern over.Colbert wrapped things up by having the cast read aloud their favorite insults of the show’s most despicable and hilarious character, noxious political aide and eventual veep, Jonah Ryan. These cruel gems include: “Childless cat-lady man”, “Disney plus extra chromosomes”, “Harry No-Styles”, “Rape-It Ralph”, “Moonsucker”, “Satellite licker”, “face-circumcised” and “stock photo for sperm-bank reject”.Right as Simons, the actor who played Ryan, broke the news that the fundraiser exceeded its stated goal of $600,000, Iannucci tossed out on final new Jonah barb that he’d come up with earlier in the day:“Jonah, even if you fell into the world’s most powerful castration machine, you’d still come out of it a dick.” More

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      Jimmy Kimmel on Trump campaign hacks: ‘Shows that his password is McNuggets123’

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      Late-night hosts talk the Trump campaign’s multiple campaign hacks, Kamala Harris’s lead among young voters and a dubious new Trump merchandise product.Jimmy KimmelThe Trump campaign has now been hacked twice in the last two months, “which is what happens when you store secret documents next to the urinal at a golf course”, said Jimmy Kimmel on Wednesday evening.Intelligence officials suspect Iran is behind at least one attack, leading campaign spokesman Steven Cheung to claim that the attacks show how Iran is “terrified of the strength and resolve of Donald J Trump”.“And it also shows that his password is McNuggets123,” Kimmel joked.One of the journalists who received the leaked documents said the material may be “embarrassing or problematic” to members of the Trump campaign. “As if anyone who works for the Trump campaign is capable of embarrassment,” Kimmel noted.In other campaign news, Trump was in Georgia on Tuesday, “where they’re working very hard to fix the election for him”, and “once again, he had a lil McFit about whether or not Kamala Harris worked at McDonalds”. Trump repeatedly and falsely said Harris never worked for the fast-food chain, calling her past employment a “lie”.“He really should just be running for Mayor McCheese,” said Kimmel. “It’s so dumb, it’s so petty, but so is he.”Seth MeyersOn Late Night, Seth Meyers laughed at Trump’s campaign trail confession that his “personality defect” is wanting people to like him. “By his own confession, he likes people who like him, and that’s it,” said Meyers. “He doesn’t care about policy or character or integrity. He you like him, he likes you.”That’s why Trump endorsed Mark Robinson, the scandal-plagued Republican candidate for governor of North Carolina. In multiple appearances, Trump praised Robinson, who is Black, saying: “I’ve gotten to know him so well.” He also described Robinson as a “fine wine”, “Martin Luther King on steroids” and “Martin Luther King times two”.“He’s really truly amazing,” said Meyers of Trump. “Everyone agrees Martin Luther King is a great person, but only Trump would say ‘I know someone twice as good! Every night he has two dreams!’”Among Robinson’s numerous scandals is a CNN report of his past racist comments on a pornographic website called Nude Africa, including calling himself a “black Nazi”. In another comment, Robinson, using his full name in his username, said slavery was “not bad” and that he wished it would come back.“First of all, who uses their full name on a porn website?” Meyers wondered. “I don’t even use my full name when I make a dinner reservation – I use Jimmy Fallon, because I want a table.”Despite his past support of Robinson, the Trump campaign is now pretending they don’t know him, and have removed joint events from their calendar. “A healthy, functional political party would do some introspection about how and why they keep attracting deranged extremists and anti-social weirdos like these guys,” Meyers concluded. “But the GOP would rather lie and pretend they have never had anything to do with Robinson in the first place.”Stephen ColbertAnd on the Late Show, Stephen Colbert cited a new Harvard youth voting poll that found Harris leads young female voters 70% to 23%. “Young women are going to save us all. And young men are going to play Xbox and see how high they can jump off a big rock,” Colbert joked.In an effort to attract young voters, the Harris campaign has committed to visiting over 150 college campuses. “Ooh, 150, she’s trying to break Matt Gaetz’s record,” Colbert quipped. “I’m kidding, obviously he’d never date a college girl. Or, as he calls them, mature honeys.”According to a polling director at Harvard, the results show “a significant shift in the overall vibe”.“Yeah the vibes are immaculate,” Colbert said. “The analysis shows that Harris ate and left no crumbs. Her campaign had a bussin’ glow-up. In conclusion, the children have broken my brain. Boots king!”In other news, “Trump may be busy campaigning, but he’ll never lose sight of his first love: selling garbage,” said Colbert. On Tuesday, the former president announced that he’d be selling silver Trump coins with his face on them. The coins are selling for $100 apiece, though the silver they’re made of only costs $30.“What a deal!” Colbert deadpanned, before imagining one man’s justification for buying the coins: “Honey, I know I bought a Trump coin at a 210% loss, but you can use the Trump coin to buy Truth Social stock, and once that eventually bounces back we’ll invest the profit in an NFT trading card of his gold sneakers, which is pegged to the price of the little pieces of his suit we got from when he got arrested, then convert it to Trump crypto, which we’ll use to buy Melania’s book, which, get this, is worth one Trump silver coin.” More

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      Jon Stewart on Harris’s debate performance: ‘She crushed that’

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      Late-night hosts recapped the first presidential debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris on ABC News.Jon StewartJon Stewart took over his guest perch at the Daily Show on Tuesday for a live post-debate show, reeling from over 90 minutes of heated conversation between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.“I just want to say that after surviving the PTSD of the last presidential debate, how unbelievably refreshing it is to go back to the same old nobody is going to answer any fucking questions! We’re back!” Stewart joked of the “cliches” and “baseless ad hominems” of American political theater.Early in the matchup, Trump claimed that “everybody” wanted Roe v Wade overturned and the legality of abortion left up to states, which Harris accurately disputed. “I have talked with women around our country,” she said. “You wanna talk about, this is what people wanted? Pregnant women who want to carry a pregnancy to term, suffering from a miscarriage, being denied care in an emergency room because the healthcare providers are afraid they might go to jail – and she’s bleeding out in a car in the parking lot? She didn’t want that.”“Holy shit! She crushed that,” said Stewart.Stewart ran through highlights of the debate, including when Harris got under Trump’s skin about the crowd sizes at his rallies, or when Trump tried to deny that he had any role in January 6. But ultimately, “I don’t know if this debate is going to change anything,” said Stewart. “People are often set in the manner that they view these proceedings. What I think is a home run answer for one candidate, someone else views as a dodge or a lie.“It doesn’t matter what they say any more, but one thing will always be true – and it is the quality of the former president I respect the least,” he continued. “Whenever he is cornered and forced to face even the smallest of consequences for his own mendacity and scheming, he reverts to the greatest refuge of scoundrels.”That would be the classic line of deflection – “it wasn’t me” – which Trump basically used for January 6.“This man, who constantly professes to be your champion, who says they’re going to have to go through him to get to you, will always, when the boat is going down, be the first into the lifeboats,” Stewart declared with palpable anger. “Because in that moment, he will always say the same thing: ‘I didn’t know anything about it, I was just told to show up for a cruise.’ Even though, everybody knows, he was the fucking captain of the ship.“In any other country, that lack of accountability would be disqualifying,” he concluded.Stephen Colbert“Unlike the first presidential debate back in June, this time the Democratic candidate was able to walk out to the stage without pausing for a nap,” said Stephen Colbert on the Late Show.The host was impressed with the vice-president’s performance. “Kamala Harris came in needing to rattle Trump’s cage,” he said. “And now that it’s over, they are still looking for pieces of his cage in low orbit.“Harris got under his skin like she was stuffing in butter and rosemary. It was beautiful,” he continued. “By the end of the debate, the meat was falling off the bone.”Trump was “so nonsensical” throughout the debate, that Harris “looked at him the way a parent looks at a kid giving a presentation on why they should be allowed to get a pet tiger”.When the moderators asked a basic question on Roe v Wade, Trump “lied so fragrantly” that the ABC News moderator Linsey Davis had to intervene with the fact-check “there is no state where it is legal to kill a baby after it is born”.“Follow up question: can a moderator win a debate?” Colbert quipped.Harris often returned to a theme of looking toward the future, to “turn the page” on the Trump years.“Actually, turning the page seems kind of mild,” said Colbert. “I would say we should burn the book, but that’s really more his thing.”Jimmy KimmelIn Los Angeles, Jimmy Kimmel also dug into “the debate of the decade”.“It was like watching the Lorax debate the Grinch tonight,” he said. “Usually when Trump gets a spanking like this from a woman it’s with a Forbes magazine. Kamala was pushing his buttons like a 12-year-old playing Fortnite.”Though Republicans urged Trump to stay focused on the issues, he did anything but. “Who are we kidding? This election isn’t about the issues,” said Kimmel. “Dick Cheney isn’t voting for Kamala Harris because he agrees with her on the issues. He’s voting for her because there’s a rhinoceros charging, and she has the tranquilizer gun.”Kimmel zeroed in on the moment when Trump repeated false stories about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, eating cats and dogs, which has been repeatedly debunked. Nevertheless, Trump said: “They’re eating all the pets of the people that live there.”“I want you to imagine that we’ve never heard of Donald Trump before, and the first time you’ve ever seen him was during tonight’s debate,” said Kimmel. “What would your reaction be right now? You’d be in shock. The Republican party would have to close their headquarters and turn them into a Spirit Halloween store.“How is it possible that half of this country thinks that it’s a good idea to give the guy who tried to overthrow our government another chance to run our government?” he concluded. “Like if someone poisoned all the jalapeño poppers at TGI Fridays, you wouldn’t interview them to be the chef!” More

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      Saturday Night Live seeks fresh Biden as political comedy faces new era

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      The US presidential election may be over but another keenly watched contest is just beginning. Who should play Joe Biden on Saturday Night Live?Jim Carrey quit the role last Saturday after poor reviews. Alex Moffat, a regular cast member, stepped in for that night’s episode. But it still remains uncertain which actor will portray Biden on a show that helps define each American presidency in the popular imagination.It is just one example of the new challenges facing political satire as Donald Trump leaves the presidential stage. The 45th president offered endless material for late-night TV hosts, standup comedians and cartoonists. His Democratic successor appears to be a less obvious target.“There is about a two-minute hole in every late-night monologue beginning on January 20,” observed Bill Whalen, a former media consultant for the ex-California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. “Two minutes every night reserved to Trump jokes and Trump bashing: that ends as soon as Biden takes office. So how do you fill the void?”Based in New York, SNL started on the NBC network in 1975 and has been more or less nailing presidents ever since. Chevy Chase played Gerald Ford as bumbling and accident-prone. Dana Carvey was so spot-on as George HW Bush that he earned an invitation to the White House.Will Ferrell captured George W Bush’s word-mangling incoherence. Jay Pharoah was praised for his Barack Obama impression but left the show prematurely. Whalen added: “Obama they had a hard time mocking because Obama was Mr Cool, and how do you make fun of Mr Cool? So I think comedy took a bit of a time out during the Obama years and came roaring back with Trump.”Alec Baldwin’s devastating rendition of Trump as an ignorant idiot, complete with pursed lips and blond wig, frequently went viral and earned the president’s wrath. Melissa McCarthy’s fast and furious take on his first press secretary, Sean Spicer, also struck comedy gold.On one level it is entertainment, but SNL’s cultural significance should not be underestimated, argues Michael Cornfield, a political scientist at George Washington University in Washington. “The central angle of approach to a president’s character is through the Saturday Night Live caricature,” he said.SNL has already found its Kamala Harris in Maya Rudolph, but Biden is proving a tougher nut to crack. He has been played by cast members and guest stars including Jason Sudeikis, Woody Harrelson and John Mulaney. Carrey signed on for this year’s election campaign but his manic performances arguably missed the mark.“Jim Carrey was doing Jim Carrey,” Cornfield observed. “He didn’t communicate Biden.”So Moffat, who has previously played Trump’s son Eric, took over as Biden for an opening sketch in which the vice-president, Mike Pence (Beck Bennett), received a Covid-19 vaccine. But Moffat is only 38, less than half Biden’s age, leaving next year’s all-important casting an open question, along with broader questions of where to find humour in the coming presidency.Cornfield commented: “To me, the comedy of the administration shapes up as one of these workplace sitcoms where the central character, Biden, has to be carrying on gamely while everything around him is going nuts.“Biden’s personality is tough because you don’t want to make fun of his stuttering. You don’t want to make fun of his tragedies. What you want to make fun of is he’s going to pretend that everything is right: ‘Oh sure, I’ll negotiate with the Republicans. No problem. Oh sure, I’ll make the federal government work. No problem.’ That’s his pretence and that’s up for lampooning because it won’t.“Now having said that, I don’t think it will be what we’ve lived through the last four years. We don’t need [Armando] Iannucci-level viciousness because I don’t think that’s called for. But there is a need to make fun of the president. That’s very American.”Cornfield has a suggestion for the role: Ted Danson, who turns 73 next week and appeared with Harrelson in the long-running sitcom Cheers. “He’s got that big smile and that cocky how-you-doin’ demeanor and he knows how to react to people who are just not doing the job or are completely nuts. There’s great comedy to be had when somebody is trying to pretend that everything is is going smoothly when it’s not.”Even so, just as cable news is reportedly bracing for a loss of viewers after the “Trump bump”, political satirists could be forgiven for thinking that a golden age is coming to an end.Trump’s crass remarks, badly spelled tweets and bizarre behaviour – from gazing up at a solar eclipse to slow-walking down a ramp – have been the gift that keeps on giving. It is safe to assume that Biden will not suggest bleach as a coronavirus cure.The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, The Daily Show with Trevor Noah and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver are among the TV programmes that have thrived on dark humour in the Trump years, making sense of the chaos for viewers, channeling their anger and fear and conveying a pointed message.Colbert now draws far more viewers than his late-night rivals Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel, neither of whom targeted Trump so directly. He also had a hand in Our Cartoon President, a barbed animated series about Trump and his entourage.Stephen Farnsworth, co-author of Late Night with Trump: Political Humor and the American Presidency, said in an email: “From President Trump’s angry, blustery falsehoods to his clown car entourage, Saturday Night Live and late night comedy have never had it so good. When America has an over-the-top president, one who needs to be in the public eye 24/7, the jokes practically write themselves.“That ends in January. When compared to the current president, Joe Biden is a far less compelling character for humor and doesn’t display the same neediness for public attention. What’s more, Trump’s exaggerated physical mannerisms and speech patterns, captured so effectively by Alec Baldwin, made him easier to imitate than many political figures.”Farnsworth, political science professor at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Virginia, added: “Biden is much more measured in what he says and does than is Trump, and that’s not good for comedy. Biden used to be known for a malapropism or two, but his 2020 campaign was a highly controlled exercise, particularly compared to Biden’s time as vice-president or as a senator.”Trump’s departure, however, is also coming as a relief to comedy performers and writing. There are have been moments when he can seem beyond satire and when it is easier to cry than laugh. A novelist might find him frustratingly two-dimensional.Steve Bodow, a former head writer and executive producer of The Daily Show, told the Washington Post last month: “I feel confident saying most writers of late night will not only be politically and patriotically happier, but they’ll be comedically happier. The thing about Trump is there’s nothing new there; there’s just not that much to chew off the bone. It can be utterly exhausting.”Trump was a Falstaffian figure but the consequences of his actions, especially during the deadly coronavirus pandemic, were anything but funny. Biden’s own life has been scarred by personal loss and he inherits a country facing multiple crises – and where Trump is likely to remain a political player.Sidney Blumenthal, a former assistant and senior adviser to President Bill Clinton, said: “The larger-than-life element about Biden is tragedy. Making fun of his speech is making fun of someone who through immense willpower overcame the disability of stuttering.”He added: “The one person who gets Biden best is Stephen Colbert, who, like Biden, is a deeply rooted liberal Catholic.“The fundamental problem is that we have yet to reckon with the immensity of the mourning and grief of what will likely be a half-million dead, which should have been largely preventable by the clownish sadist who provided so much fun before he ushered in a reign of death.” More