Late-night was a somber affair on Monday night (July 15) as hosts Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, and Anthony Anderson (filling in for Jimmy Kimmel) addressed the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump on Saturday (July 13).
All three hosts denounced the shooting and called for the end of “hatred and vitriol in our politics.” Elsewhere, The Daily Show decided to skip its Monday show, canceling its original plans to cover the Republican National Convention from Milwaukee, and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon chose to avoid the topic altogether.
Read more below to see each late-night host’s reaction to the attempted assassination.
Stephen Colbert Expresses Relief that Trump Lived
“The United States came close to a great tragedy on Saturday, when at a political rally down in Pennsylvania, a 20-year-old gunman shot and nearly killed a former president and the man who today became the 2024 Republican nominee,” Colbert said in a pre-taped opening monologue ahead of Monday’s live edition of The Late Show.
“My immediate reaction when I saw this on Saturday were horror at what was unfolding, relief that Donald Trump had lived, and frankly, grief for my beautiful country,” he continued.
He went on to say that “violence has no role in our politics” and that “the entire objective of a democracy is to fight out our differences with, as the saying goes, ballot not a bullet.”
“In the wake of this attack on Saturday, many Americans on both sides of the aisle — from President Biden to Speaker Johnson — are calling on all of us to change how we see each other, how we treat each other, how we talk to each other,” Colbert added. “So this week, we’re going to do our best to talk about those ideas, the people who represent those ideas, and many other things with guests, and who knows, if we’re lucky, maybe some fart jokes.”
Seth Meyers Calls on Americans to Safeguard Democracy
“Political violence must be rejected in all its forms,” Meyers said at the top of Monday’s show. “It’s a poison to democracy. We must all condemn it.”
Meyers said he was reminded of another time when he had to open his show talking about a scene of political violence after the January 6, 2021, Capitol attack.
“I said then that multiracial, pluralistic democracy is fragile and precious. It requires our vigilance, stewardship and protection,” he explained. “That’s as true now as it was then, and in light of the horrific events at a Trump rally on Saturday, it’s clear that we must recommit ourselves to that endeavor as fully and as steadfastly as we can.”
He said that in his ten years hosting Late Night he has “witnessed far too many shocking scenes of political violence, from Charlottesville, to Jan. 6, to an attack on the spouse of Nancy Pelosi, to a shooting at a congressional baseball practice, to a kidnapping plot against the governor of Michigan and now an assassination attempt on the life of Donald Trump.”
Meyers called on Americans “to do the difficult work of safeguarding this cherished enterprise” like the previous generations that “protected democracy and passed it on to us.”
Anthony Anderson Attempts A Few Jokes Around the Incident
Anderson, who was guest hosting Jimmy Kimmel Live, was the only host who attempted a few jokes during his opening monologue.
“You know, all weekend, I kept thinking: ‘I wonder what Jimmy Kimmel’s going to say about this on Monday,’ and then I was, like, ‘Oh s***, I am Jimmy Kimmel on Monday!’”
The Black-ish actor went on to say that his thoughts are with the victims, adding, “hopefully this is a moment we can all take a step back from the hatred and vitriol in our politics and maybe chill the f*** out.”
He also touched on the media’s reaction to the violence, saying, “Now, a lot has been written about the attack, but the award for the worst article about it goes to Forbes, who retracted this dumb*** story, ‘Will Surviving Gunfire Be Donald Trump’s Next Appeal to Black Voters?’ What? Getting shot at doesn’t make you popular in the Black community. If it did, then the most famous man in the hood would be Liam Neeson.”
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