Jimmy Kimmel
Jimmy Kimmel had a field day with Donald Trump’s “major announcement” awkwardly teased this week on his social network, Truth Social: his debut NFT collection of digital superhero cards.
“Trading cards! Not even real trading cards – digital trading cards,” he mocked. “Which is another way of saying nothing. At least last time you got a red hat, now he’s selling you nothing.
“Did you know you used to be president of the United States?” he said as he played clips from Trump’s video announcement, in which he said the price ($99 each) “doesn’t sound like very much for what you’re getting”.
“Yes, it does,” Kimmel retorted. “It seems like $99 is too much, actually.”
The NFT announcement was “like QAnon meets QVC”, he added. “I know we say ‘this is crazy’ a lot, but this is crazy. He’s selling NFTs! It’s like he’s a crypto bro or something. While he’s running for president! And by the way, we already have Donald Trump trading cards – they’re called subpoenas.
“This has to be the most pathetic announcement of all time,” he concluded, “and that includes when they announced Eric was born.”
Stephen Colbert
For his final monologue of 2022, Stephen Colbert also tore into Trump’s NFT collection.
“That’s right, you read that right. The ex-president of the United States, the ex-most powerful man in the world, has launched a line of trading cards,” the Late Show host said. “It’s Gropémon with Pikacoup. This is the least dignified attempt at post-presidential merchandising since the launch of Tickle-Me-Truman.
“He’s a business genius, jumping in on the NFT market when it’s at his hottest,” Colbert deadpanned. “Next, he’s releasing an exclusive line of rotary phones.”
The cards “allow you to collect all your favorite characters from the extended former president universe, because every card is him”, he added. “There’s – and these are all real – him playing golf, him approving of gold, him wearing a hat that says Dow just like they do on Wall Street, and him stealing the torch from the Statue of Liberty.”
All of these cards are, as Colbert said, “equally stupidest”, including one of Trump standing on the 45-yard line holding a football, dressed as a pilot standing atop the earth, and as an astronaut wearing sunglasses.
The fine print for the digital cards includes the line “you understand and agree that the NFTs have no inherent monetary value”.
“Solid,” Colbert laughed. “Reminds me of the Arby’s slogan: We make absolutely no promise or guarantee that what we have is meats.”
“In a way, this is all kind of gratifying to me,” he concluded, “because a monster who tried to install himself as our fascist strongman is now reduced to hawking a line of trading cards.”
Seth Meyers
Trump’s major announcement “turned out to be so much more pathetic than anyone could’ve possibly imagined”, said Seth Meyers on Late Night.
“Also, gotta love the timing of a former president launching an NFT line the same week a crypto scammer gets arrested,” he added, referring to the arrest of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried in the Bahamas on eight charges of fraud.
Meyers also mocked Trump’s promotional strategy, which included a video in which the former president said: “Remember, Christmas is coming, and this makes a great Christmas gift.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Meyers responded. “I don’t care if you’re the biggest Trump fan in the world – if on Christmas morning you give your spouse a thoughtful gift in a beautifully wrapped box with a bow on it, that they get to open and physically hold in their hands, and then they turn around and tell you, ‘Your gift isn’t here, it’s a digital trading card of Donald Trump as a sunglasses astronaut,’ you’re getting a divorce.
“This proves once again that for anyone involved in the attempted coup on January 6, things will not end well,” he concluded. “In Trump’s case, he’s such a pariah he’s hawking scam digital trading cards on a social media site no one’s heard of.”
