Trevor Noah

Jussie Smollett was arrested Thursday morning for disorderly conduct after he allegedly staged a hate crime, and by Thursday night, Trevor Noah was at a loss for words. “Are you kidding me?” he said on the Daily Show. Even more baffling, Chicago police said that the Empire star paid friends to stage the attack because he was dissatisfied with his salary. “This dude may have faked a hate crime just to get a raise?” Noah said bewildered. “What’s the logic there?”

A fake hate crime is “not a good way to get a raise”, Noah continued. “I mean, call me old-fashioned, but whatever happened to just going into your boss’s office and blackmailing him with nudes?”

Part of the intense response to the news stemmed from a disconnect between Smollett’s motive and the audacity of the staged attack. “This is such a petty reason to pull off such a major crime,” Noah observed. “Imagine if we found out the reason Tupac faked his own death was just to get out of a Blockbuster late fee.”

Smollett has left a compelling trail of evidence, according to Chicago police, and he’ll likely to go to prison (the maximum sentence for his charge is three years). But he leaves behind a trail of damage.

“Nobody won in this thing,” said Noah, though he found a small silver lining. “When this started out it was a story about people who hated Jussie Smollett because he was black and gay. But now, people hate him because he’s an asshole.

“In other words, they’re judging him on the content of his character, and not the color of his skin, and that, my friends, is progress.”

Stephen Colbert

Stephen Colbert also addressed the Jussie Smollett story on Thursday’s Late Show. “Now, this story involves race, sexuality, politics, and violence so I need to tread very lightly here and simply say: what a dick.”

Some details in the case revealed by Chicago police were, indeed, bizarre and confounding, such as Smollett’s payment by check to two black men, Nigerian American brothers, to stage a hate crime on the night of 29 January.

“Look, I’m no expert, but if you’re going to fake a white supremacist hate crime, hire two white guys,” Colbert joked. “This is one place where you don’t want diversity.”

Jokes aside, Colbert acknowledged that the whole case “is just depressing ... It’s a horrible affront to actual victims of hate crimes”, even worse because “it’s done horribly”.

There’s no good reason to damage trust in victims of real (and increasing) hate crimes by staging one, Colbert continued, but Smollett’s attempt to raise his salary through attention was “a particularly bad one”.

“He staged a hate crime to boost his career? I mean, there are legitimate ways to do that,” Colbert said. “Has he never heard of a sex tape?”

Seth Meyers

On Late Night, Seth Meyers reviewed a brief history of justice obstruction as reports circulated that Robert Mueller will deliver his two-year investigative report to the attorney general next week.

How is the president preparing for this potentially bombshell document? Blame, deflection, tweets, arguing from the Oval Office for Space Force and border walls.

“Space Force and borders. It’s pretty telling that despite the effects of climate change, gun violence, and inadequate healthcare, Trump thinks the biggest threats to America are asylum seekers and Klingons,” Meyers said.

Trump has never been subtle about his attempts to thwart the Mueller investigation into Russia’s election meddling; for further evidence, Meyers turned to recent interviews with former acting FBI director Andrew McCabe, whose new book recounts Trump’s demands for loyalty and distrust of American intelligence. On one occasion, McCabe recounted, Trump openly said he trusted Putin’s claims about North Korea more than intelligence officials.

“Say what you will about Trump – he might be a criminal, but at least he’s super obvious about it,” said Meyers. “It’s like if someone asked Barry Bonds if he wanted to take batting practice, and he said, ‘Not right now, I have to go take my steroids’.”