Late-night hosts mocked Donald Trump’s rejection by Nato allies for help with the strait of Hormuz and a White House visit from the Irish prime minister for St Patrick’s Day.
Seth Meyers
On Late Night, Seth Meyers recalled the many, many times that Trump insulted Nato, only to turn around and ask them this week for help with strait of Hormuz, blocked by his war with Iran. “You called them obsolete, sloppy and bad, and now you want their help?” Meyers marveled. “It’s like breaking up with someone and then immediately asking them for help moving – ‘I know I called you obsolete and sloppy, but I didn’t say you were bad at carrying things! Now hop to it, fatso, I gotta date tonight!’”
The response from Nato members has been a resounding no, even from US allies like Germany and Britain. “You mean to tell me your genius plan of continually insulting them for 10-plus years and then begging them to help you out of a jam you got yourself into didn’t work?” Meyers laughed. “But again, this is just how Donald Trump does friendship. It’s not ‘I got your back, you got mine.’ It’s ‘you get my back, and while you’re there can you give me a back rub?’”
Nato countries “have made the very reasonable observation that this is not a war they started, it’s not on or near their territory and it’s not within the scope of their mission”, he continued. So Trump tried to insist that they need the oil, “while inadvertently revealing that maybe, maybe this entire debacle was completely unnecessary”.
As Trump put it on Air Force One: “It’s the place where they get their energy. And they should come and they should help us protect it. You could make the case that maybe we shouldn’t even be there at all, because we don’t need it. We have a lot of oil.”
“Man, it’s a shame no one made that case before we went!” Meyers responded. “I mean, there are so many cases to make here. You could make the case that we shouldn’t be there at all. You could make the case that this was an unnecessary and an unprovoked war of choice, you could make the case that this reckless and illegal war would destabilize the region. You could make the case that Trump lied to his supporters by promising no new wars, and then launched another disastrous open-ended war. I mean, at this point, you could probably make the case that this is going so badly because Trump mixed up the plans for war with Iran and war with Greenland.”
Meyers had a suggestion for Nato: “Just to troll him, they should say ‘OK, we will help, ‘and then send him” what he once proclaimed to be Greenland’s defense system: “two dogsleds”.
Jimmy Kimmel
On Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the host acknowledged St Patrick’s Day, which included the annual ceremonial White House visit by the Irish prime minister – “a standing appointment to get together with the president of the United States once a year, just like Melania.”
Taoiseach Micheál Martin brought a bowl of shamrocks to Trump – a customary gift, “and also the closest Trump has gotten to a salad that isn’t in a taco shell in quite some time,” Kimmel quipped.
The host then touched on the resignation of Joe Kent, director of the National Counterterrorism Center and a far-right political figure, over Trump’s war in Iran. “I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran,” he wrote in his resignation letter. “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation …”
“This is not some radical deep state operative left over from the Biden administration. Kent was a big Maga guy that Trump appointed,” Kimmel explained. “You get the sense that every one of these Republicans has their ass cheeks clenched tightly right now, hoping he puts an end to this war as soon as possible.”
Nevertheless, Trump’s war continues, allegedly until he feels it should end “in his bones”. When asked to clarify that Trump remark, the speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, said: “Well, I think his bones are informed by the intelligence.”
“Which seems unlikely to me, seeing as how he doesn’t even read the intelligence briefings they give him every day,” Kimmel noted. “His bones aren’t informed by intelligence. His bones are informed by fried chicken and boniva.”
Stephen Colbert
And on the Late Show, Stephen Colbert also touched on the Irish leader’s visit to the White House, where Trump was awkwardly asked about the Irish president’s direct criticism of his “illegal” war in Iran. Trump responded: “He’s lucky I exist, that’s all I can say.”
“Ok, first off, the president of Ireland is a woman,” Colbert responded. “Second, calling an Irish person ‘lucky’ is just another racist stereotype. I am Irish-American, and it’s like saying we’re all pale, we all drink whiskey and have 10 siblings and make our children listen to sad poetry and … oh God, that’s me.”
Colbert then turned to the still-blocked strait of Hormuz. “With the oil shipments blocked, gas prices up and our allies sitting this one out, everybody’s asking: how much longer are we going to do this?”
According to Trump, speaking from the Oval Office, the war will end “soon”, and next he plans to take Cuba. “Trump is confident the island is ready to fall, because the US has blockaded Cuba from all energy shipments,” Colbert explained. To lift it, Trump has demanded that Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel step down, part of a strategy the White House has said will force “regime compliance” rather than regime change.
“It’s a proven strategy that’s already worked other places like Venezuela and CBS,” Colbert quipped.
