Late night hosts took their shots at Donald Trump after diplomats laughed at the president during his United Nations General Assembly speech. The inciting incident, in which the UN crowd chuckled when Trump announced that he’d done more in his first two years in office than almost any other president in history, gave Stephen Colbert plenty to work with.
Colbert offered Trump some reassurance following the embarrassment, joking, “Don’t worry Mr. President, they’re not laughing at you. They’re laughing with each other at you.” Colbert also took aim at Trump’s announcement to the crowd of world leaders that, “America is governed by Americans. We reject the ideology of globalism, and we embrace the doctrine of patriotism.” Or as Colbert summarized the speech, “Trump appeared before the United Nations to reject the notion of nations uniting.”
Seth Meyers too dedicated the first part of his monologue to the UN gaffe, pointing out how immensely difficult it is to make a room full of serious diplomats giggle.
Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, and Conan O’Brien all also managed to fit the UN crackup into their opening monologues — but Nikki Haley, the United Nations Ambassador to the United Nations, says the comedians were laughing on their own.
“They loved how honest he is,” Haley said of the UN diplomats during an appearance on Fox & Friends. “It’s not diplomatic and they find it funny. … When he goes and he is very truthful, they kind of were taken back by it.”
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