Jon Stewart sent a blunt message to pollsters during his US election coverage, which saw Donald Trump claim a shock victory over Kamala Harris.
Trump has been reelected president having swept several key battleground states hours after the polls closed leaving him only the second man to be reelected president in non-consecutive terms.
Stewart ended his election day edition of The Daily Show at midnight Eastern Time and used his closing message to criticise pollsters, who throughout the campaign had predicted that Harris would narrowly win the election.
“It hasn’t been completely called yet. We don’t exactly know what all the results are going to be. Our time is running out. I do want to very quickly send a quick message to all the pollsters, the election pollsters, um, ‘Blow me,’” said the comedian.
“I don’t ever want to f***ing hear from you again. Ever. I don’t ever want to hear, ‘We’ve corrected for the overcorrection video with the voters!’ You don’t know s*** about s***, and I don’t care for you,” said Stewart in a scathing rant.
Although visibly frustrated, Stewart did try to end the show with a positive, albeit sobering message.
The 61-year-old said: “Look, look, look. Here’s the thing. Well, here’s what we know, is that we don’t really know anything and that we’re going to come out of this election, and we’re going to make all kinds of pronouncements about what this country is and what this world is. And the truth is, we’re not really going to know s***. And we’re going to make it seem like this is the finality of our civilisation. We’re all going to have to wake up tomorrow morning and work like hell to move the world to the place that we prefer it to be. And I just want to point out, just as a matter of perspective, that the lessons that our pundits take away from these results that they will pronounce with certainty will be wrong.”
Stewart then aired a montage of other poorly aged pronouncements that have come from politicians and pundits after recent US elections, such as the decline of Trump and the end of racism.
“My point is this: F***!,” yelled Stewart. “But this isn’t the end. I promise you, this is not the end. And we have to regroup, and we have to continue to fight, and continue to work day in and day out to create the better society for our children for this world.”
At the time of writing, counting is still underway in Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Nevada.
Speaking to his jubilant supporters in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump called them “the greatest political movement of all time” and said they would “help our country heal” and would “fix everything about our country”. Trump said his victory heralded a “golden age for America” also claiming to have won the popular vote.
