Jimmy Kimmel
Late-night hosts mocked House Republicans’ dysfunction on Tuesday evening as they failed, for three weeks running, to elect a speaker after ousting Kevin McCarthy. “The House of Representatives is now un-gaveling before our eyes,” said Jimmy Kimmel.
“In the history of our country, there’s never been a situation like this,” he continued. “And there’s nothing in the constitution that covers it because the founding fathers, as forward-thinking as they were, never imagined such a large group of elected officials being so unbelievably dumb.”
On Tuesday, House Republicans narrowed down their eight options for speaker to Minnesota’s Tom Emmer and then removed him, all within the span of four hours. “It was crazy,” Kimmel laughed. “This morning, I didn’t even know who Tom Emmer was. Now I still don’t. Altoids last longer than these Republican nominees.”
Trump’s team reportedly campaigned behind the scenes to torpedo Emmer’s chances. “Trump called him a Rino [Republican in name only] and said supporting him would be a tragic mistake. Same thing he said about Eric,” Kimmel said. “So now they’re back to square one with nobody.”
Meanwhile, the “speaker of the Waffle House” was in court on Tuesday for his New York civil fraud trial, “and oh man is he in trouble”, said Kimmel. “I’m telling you right now, Donald Trump is going to jail.”
Among the ominous developments for the former president: his former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, has immunity in the January 6 trial and will testify against him; his former lawyer Jenna Ellis pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting false statements in the Georgia election fraud trial, and will probably testify against him; and his former fixer Michael Cohen testified against him in his New York fraud trial.
“Right now, half of Trump’s lawyers are trying to keep him out of prison, the other half are trying to keep themselves out of prison,” Kimmel joked.
Stephen Colbert
“The House GOP has repeatedly humiliated itself with its inability to do even the simplest legislative function: pick a speaker of the House, proving themselves to be not so much a legislative body, but a flaming bag of poop left on the Capitol’s doorstep,” said Stephen Colbert on the Late Show.
And Tuesday was the “piece de re-stupid” because after multiple rounds of voting, Republicans finally settled on Emmer, a lawmaker known for getting two DUIs and then sponsoring legislation to lower the legal penalties for drunk driving.
“OK, so a little self-serving,” Colbert joked. “He also introduced HR 2435: That Mailbox Was Already Knocked Down.
“So maybe not the perfect candidate, but Republicans were this close to having a functioning government,” Colbert explained. “Which is, of course, Donald Trump’s mortal enemy.” And the former president took to Truth Social to criticize Emmer, effectively ending his chances of becoming speaker. He dropped out of the race shortly after.
“Farewell, Tom Emmer. You will be Googled,” Colbert deadpanned. “At this point, I’d call the GOP a clown car, but clowns go to college.”
Seth Meyers
And on Late Night, Seth Meyers relished another former Trump acolyte flipping on the former president, as Jenna Ellis became the fourth co-defendant in his Georgia election fraud trial to plead guilty. “So I guess in the end, he did teach them all the art of the deal,” Meyers quipped.
“You might remember Ellis as the least weird lawyer from this press conference,” he said over a photo of Ellis with fellow Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell. “She’s the one sticking out like a normal thumb.”
Also on Monday, the House Freedom Caucus of far-right Republicans called on its members to remain in Washington until they could pick a new speaker. “Said Matt Gaetz: ‘Aww, but I promised my girlfriend we’d go trick-or-treating,’” Meyers joked, referring to the Florida lawmaker’s scandal concerning alleged underage sex.
And the justice department filed a civil forfeiture claim for a superyacht reportedly belonging to a sanctioned Russian billionaire. “‘Hold up! Let me disembark first!’ said Clarence Thomas,” Meyers joked.
