Stephen Colbert on Trump’s win: ‘The deep shock and sense of loss is enormous’

Late-night hosts discussed Donald Trump’s victory over Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election, sending him back to the White House.

Stephen Colbert

Stephen Colbert didn’t mince words on the results of the 2024 election: “Well, fuck. It happened, again,” he said. “After a bizarre and vicious campaign fueled by a desperate need not to go to jail, Donald Trump has won the 2024 election.

“The deep shock and sense of loss is enormous,” he continued. “But let’s look at the bright side. This way at least there’ll be a peaceful transfer of power. Mike Pence, olly olly oxen free. All day yesterday, I was walking around proudly wearing my ‘I Voted’ sticker. Today I wore my, ‘I am questioning my fundamental belief in the goodness of humanity’ sticker.

“Now as a late-night host, people often say to me, ‘Come on, part of you has gotta want Trump to win because he gives you so much material to work with,’” he added. “No. No one tells the guy who cleans the bathroom, ‘Wow, you must love it when someone has explosive diarrhea, there’s so much material for you to work with!’

“I wish, you wish, so many of us wish this hadn’t happened,” he continued, “but that is not for any of us to decide. This is a democracy. That’s Democracy with a capital ‘duh’. And in this democracy, the majority has spoken, and they said they don’t actually care that much about democracy.”

The Late Show host congratulated Harris and Tim Walz on running an “extraordinary” 107-day campaign, and looked to the bleak future. “The first time Donald Trump was elected, he started as a joke and ended as a tragedy. This time he starts as a tragedy. Who knows what he’ll end as – a limerick?

“Who knows what the next four years are going to be like,” he added. “What we do know is that we are going to be governed by a monstrous child surrounded by cowards and grifters, and my brain keeps pumping out an unlimited supply of ramifications. It’s really hard to see a bright side here.”

But “we can take comfort in knowing that we’ve been here before. We know what’s coming,” he concluded. And there would be jokes, “because that’s what we do. And I’ll let you in on a little secret. No one gets into this business because everything in their life worked out great, so were built for rough roads. You guys ready?”

Jimmy Kimmel

“Let me tell you, that was the worst Taco Tuesday of my whole life,” said Jimmy Kimmel on Wednesday evening. “We had the choice between a prosecutor and a criminal and we chose the criminal to be president of the United States. More than half of this country voted for the criminal who’s planning to pardon himself for his crimes. I guess this election wasn’t rigged.”

Fighting back tears, Kimmel listed everyone that Trump’s election will hurt: “It was a terrible night for women, for children, for the hundreds of thousands of hard-working immigrants who make this country go, for healthcare, for our climate, for scientists, for journalists, for justice, for free speech. It was a terrible night for poor people, for the middle class, for seniors who rely on social security, for our allies in Ukraine, for Nato and democracy and decency. It was a terrible night for everyone who voted against him and guess what? It was a bad night for everyone who voted for him, too. You just don’t realize it yet.”

It was a good night, however, for Putin, polio and “lovable billionaires like Elon Musk and the bros up in Silicon Valley and all the wriggling brain worms who sold what was left of their souls to bow down to Donald Trump”.

“But I’m gonna say something that Trump would never say unless it favored him,” he added. “The people voted and this is the choice we made. In January, Donald Trump becomes president and that’s that, he won. It doesn’t mean we give up, but it also doesn’t mean we storm the Capitol because we don’t like the result.”

Despite a lot of people not wanting to hear any silver lining, Kimmel endeavored to end on a positive note. “The best I can come up with is, we’ve been through this once before and yes, this time it is probably going to be worse, maybe a lot worse, but I also think that maybe we will look back and realize that in the long run, this is what we needed to wake us up,” he concluded. “Maybe the people who care so much about him need to find out how little he cares about them.”

Seth Meyers

And on Late Night, Seth Meyers also mourned Trump’s victory, noting that he will be the oldest person to ever take office and the first convicted felon. “When I was in grade school, they always told us anyone could grow up to be president, but they didn’t say ‘literally fucking anyone’,” he joked.

“I wish I had some trenchant words of wisdom to impart,” he later added. “I’m sad to say I don’t. We’re about to step over the precipice into truly uncharted territory. You need only look back to Trump’s first term to get a sense of how dangerous his second term will be. And no one can say they didn’t know what they were getting, because Trump made it crystal clear. All I know is that the fight for justice doesn’t end with one election.

“In times like this, when everything feels overwhelming and impossible, like all hope is lost, we have no choice but to look back on the broad scope of history,” he continued. “Justice is not automatic, comeuppance is not guaranteed, politics unfortunately is not a Marvel movie, even though Joe Biden does look eerily like old Captain America. That doesn’t mean a struggle toward a more just and compassionate world is futile, it just means it’s hard, and heartbreaking and soul-crushing and agonizing. And it never ends. Democracy does not happen only on election day.”

Meyers ended with an exhortation to his viewers to keep fighting back: “If you’re one of the tens of millions of Americans who said no to Trump’s dark, dangerous vision for America last night, now is the time to stand in solidarity with our friends, with our neighbors, with the vulnerable communities, and begin the hard work of making real the world we want to live in. That’s what we will be doing on day one.”