Late-night hosts on Wednesday discussed Donald Trump’s State of the Union address and congressional Republicans’ attempts to discredit the Russia investigation.

Late-night hosts on State of the Union: 'This wasn't a night for facts' Read more

Stephen Colbert

“Everyone is still keenly aware that Donald Trump gave a speech last night,” Stephen Colbert began. “And good news for Trump: according to CNN, 70% of the people who watched the speech had either a very positive or somewhat positive reaction, which seemed good until you learned that it was the lowest net-positive rating for a State of the Union address since CNN first asked the question.

“One person who thought Donald Trump did a great job was Donald Trump, at least judging from all the clapping he did during his own speech,” Colbert continued, showing video footage of the president applauding himself during breaks in his address.

Colbert went on: “Of course, Democrats also responded to the State of the Union, and then responded, and responded. In fact, there were a total five Democratic responses. But the unified Democratic message was clear: ‘How about this one? You like this one? What do you want from us? We’ll say it!’”

The host then noted that the official Democratic response came from Massachusetts representative Joe Kennedy III, the “lovechild of Superman and Conan O’Brien”.

“Nothing says ‘party of new ideas’ more than deploying the latest model Kennedy,” Colbert quipped. “Kennedy gave a stirring, thoughtful speech about the importance of fighting for all Americans. In the end, hard to say if it was a good speech because Kennedy did not clap for himself once.”

Samantha Bee

Samantha Bee responded to Trump’s State of the Union and discussed the controversial Nunes memo, the publication of which Republicans are hoping helps discredit Robert Mueller’s investigation.

“Last night in his State of the Union address, Donald Trump took a break from tweeting about immigrants to scream slightly more politely at lawmakers about immigrants,” Bee said, showing footage of the president stating “Americans are dreamers too”.

“Oh my God, what a beautiful, proud, thoughtful way to say that you will only help white people,” the host replied. “Rumor had it this would be an optimistic, glass-half-full-type speech, and it was, assuming that glass is half-full of cyanide and I get to drink it.”

Bee moved on: “This time last year we were taking cold comfort in the idea that checks and balances would keep Trump in line. So where did all that checky-balancy stuff go wrong?”



The host then summarized the ways in which congressional Republicans have shilled for the president with regard to the Russia investigation, showing footage of Paul Ryan raising the possibility that the FBI abused its power in investigating Trump. Bee also mentioned Devin Nunes, the California congressman who authored a controversial and supposedly misleading memo alleging oversight abuses by the FBI and DoJ.

“You remember Devin Nunes as the guy who already had to recuse himself from this very investigation for lying to protect the White House,” Bee explained. “And Nunes hasn’t even seen all the intelligence he based the memo on, so this so-called memo is more like a fun little fan fiction he wrote in his spare time.”

“But House Republicans voted to release it anyway,” the host said, noting how the popularity of the hashtag #ReleaseTheMemo, widely disseminated by Russian bots and trolls, was used as the basis for arguments to make the memo public.

“Wow, the Russian interference investigation has itself been interfered with by Russians,” the host concluded. “It’s like a turducken of treason.”



Seth Meyers

Seth Meyers also took aim at the GOP for its efforts to malign law enforcement agencies.

“While Trump managed to read off a teleprompter for 80 minutes, his White House and Republicans in Congress forged ahead with their attempts to discredit the Russia investigation and the law enforcement agencies conducting that investigation,” Meyers explained.

“Now if it sounds to you like Trump is an urgent threat to the constitution, you’re not alone,” he continued. “Even Trump’s EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, used to agree with you, as we found out when old audio from a 2016 interview surfaced for the first time yesterday.”



The host then played the audio, in which Pruitt said Trump would be “abusive to the constitution”.

“Pruitt’s evolution from Trump critic to lackey very much captures the modern GOP in a microcosm,” Meyers said. “As Trump has become more authoritarian, more unhinged, more lawless, the GOP has only gotten more protective of him.”



FBI has 'grave concerns' about Trump plan to release controversial memo Read more

He then brought up the Nunes memo, explaining that, at just four pages, it is rumored to be “selectively cherry-picked for the purpose of discrediting the FBI”.

“To be very clear, you do not have to revere the FBI to be concerned about what Trump and the GOP are doing,” Meyers concluded. “It is absolutely true that the FBI has abused its power many times throughout its history. But you can believe that and also be worried about Trump and the GOP attempting to purge law enforcement agencies for their own political ends.”

