Late-night hosts looked at the many responses to this week’s US presidential debate and how, despite criticisms of his performance, Donald Trump has still claimed victory.
Stephen Colbert
On The Late Show, Stephen Colbert gave a swift recap of this week’s much-watched debate: “Harris ran Trump over with a truck.”
Kamala Harris was seen by most as the victor of this week’s intense televised debate and Trump “clearly knew he screwed the pooch” because he went down to the spin room himself to talk to press.
The Harris camp has since asked for a second debate to which Colbert replied: “Yes sir, may I have another?”
Trump has claimed this is a sign that she lost but Colbert responded: “Or counterpoint: she tore out your heart, showed it to you while beating then ate it on national television … and now she would like seconds.”
While “obviously the most damaging moment from last night was Trump’s decision to walk onstage” Colbert also brought up the bizarre, racist theory about Haitian immigrants kidnapping and eating pets.
After Trump brought it up, it was immediately factchecked by the moderator but Trump hit back, saying it had been said on television. “The TV people said that dogs are in danger,” Colbert said in character. “They keep getting into a mystery van with some groovy teenagers.”
The “pet-eating brain worm got into Trump’s skull through JD Vance” who has been spreading it despite a lack of evidence. “Please remember to spay or neuter your JD Vance,” Colbert joked. “We don’t want more of them.”
The night of the debate also saw the long-awaited endorsement of Taylor Swift, showing support for Harris with a “knockout punch” for Vance, referring to herself as a childless cat lady, a reference to his earlier criticisms of certain American women.
“She is dragging JD Vance,” he said. “I hear he’s also the inspiration for her next album: The Tortured Couch Humpers Department.”
Jimmy Kimmel
On Jimmy Kimmel Live, the host said that the debate “couldn’t have gone better” for Harris, although not according to everyone.
“More than 67 million Americans watched the debate and the only one who seems to think that Trump did a good job was Trump himself,” he said.
Trump has been sharing unverified stats and polls that show him winning the debate with a huge majority. “He gets absolutely annihilated then pretends that he won,” he said.
He also spoke about his reticence to do a second debate because he thinks it’s a sign that Harris knows she lost the first one. Kimmel said that she “handed you your big orange ass so brutally you’re scared to face her again”.
There was also a mention of the Swift endorsement and her jab at Vance. “Good work JD, you really screwed the sofabed with this one,” he joked.
Vance’s response was to criticise Swift as a billionaire who has no ties to real Americans. Kimmel pointed out that Vance is there claiming she is “a disconnected billionaire like your running mate Donald Trump”.
There was also a tweet from Elon Musk about giving her his child, “a statement so creepy it could be Trump’s running mate”.
Kimmel is sure that we are “barely scratching the surface of what a terrible pig this JD Vance is” also criticising him for “spreading this stupid, ridiculous, nonsensical lie” about pet-eating.
The day after the debate saw both Harris and Trump appear at a 9/11 memorial ceremony in New York, with the former president telling her that she did a good job. Kimmel joked that Pence would be watching, dejected: “This guy never once told me I did a good job.”
He also quipped that this means that Harris has been “seen more in public with Trump more times than Melania this year”.
