I never thought that, after being hired at this site to cover the late-night scene, I would bear witness to its death at the hands of a crybaby convict who’s friends with pedophiles. Seeing late-night die because it has become a bit of an outdated medium that doesn’t generate the kind of ad dollars it used to? That makes sense. The writing has been on the wall for years, but the people involved in it are so talented that they’ve been able to justify keeping their jobs and giving late-night a slow and steady death that it deserves. Instead, we’re seeing it speed-run toward its death thanks to the fragile, authoritarian ego of the aforementioned rapist.
That doesn’t mean the folks in the late-night scene aren’t fighting back! All current hosts showed up on Stephen Colbert’s first show after the announcement of his firing, showing support for the soon-to-be former host (not until May, but that’ll be here before ya know it). Jon Stewart went on a fiery tirade on The Daily Show, enlisting a choir to tell the President to go f*** himself. Even Jimmy Fallon, who once rubbed Trump’s head like a puppy, keeps taking time to roast Trump on his show. What’s better, everyone is taking a similar route of attack: talk about Jeffrey Epstein.
The only thing I currently know for sure is that Trump does not want to talk about his long friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. Despite being extensively documented and discussed when Epstein was alive, Trump’s supporters have mostly turned a blind eye to his relationship with the New York Financier/monster. However, they did so under the impression that Trump would release the Epstein files at some point and take down his cabal of friends. It seems pretty clear that, once Trump remembered he was a part of that cabal, he couldn’t release the files, shaking some of his most confident supporters.
Now, after spending years mostly avoiding discussing his friendship with Epstein, it’s all anyone wants to talk about, and it’s becoming harder to avoid. Hell, he’s even suing Rupert Murdoch because the Wall Street Journal released a damning investigation into Trump giving Epstein a creepy message for his birthday, which involved him wishing each day was “another wonderful secret” and saying how “enigmas never age.” The weirdest, creepiest shit possible; Just written there for people to see. Barf. On the good side, however, it’s given the late-night hosts lots of fodder, including Jimmy Kimmel, and he’s not even working right now (Alan Cumming is filling in and taking plenty of worthy shots at Trump in the interim).
Since the President has a bunch of bald, jack-booted losers doing his racist bidding, he has plenty of time to post on Truth Social. There, he claimed that Jimmy Kimmel would soon be fired, with Jimmy Fallon following. He also mentioned that he hopes he had something to do with their removal. It’s baby shit mob speak, since we know damn well he had something to do with it, so he talks around it, even though he shouldn’t mention it at all, but he’s too stupid to be an actual mobster. Like, it’s just a threat.
We’ll have to wait and see if Disney or NBC/Universal caves to Trump’s demands or decides to have spines. Until then, Kimmel isn’t hesitating to turn the conversation right back toward Epstein. He posted Trump’s Truth Social rant on his Instagram with a simple yet effective caption: “I’m hearing you’re next. Or maybe it’s just another wonderful secret.” Maybe late-night will have the slow death I was hoping for, because I don’t think this is ending anytime soon.
