“We’re taping this just a little while after Donald Trump walked into the White House briefing room, actually, and tried to poison American democracy,” Stephen Colbert began tonight’s episode of Late Show, filmed after President Trump’s Thursday evening address, in which he baselessly alleged widespread voter fraud as the cause of his evaporating lead in uncalled states like Pennsylvania and Georgia, a claim his campaign is attempting to back up by contesting the election in the courts.
“Donald Trump tried really hard to kill something tonight,” said the late-night host, who reportedly scrapped his opening remarks after the address. “If you did not know that Joe Biden was getting close to 270 [electoral votes], Donald Trump just provided all the proof you will ever need.”
And while the president had previously discussed rejecting the results of the election if it didn’t go his way, says Colbert, that doesn’t mean it’s not terrible to watch. “We all knew he would do this,” the late-night host said, choking up. “What I didn’t know is that it would hurt so much. I didn’t expect this to break my heart. For him to cast a dark shadow on our most sacred right from the briefing room in the White House? Our house, not his. That is devastating.”
In the meantime, Colbert calls on Republicans to take a stand against the president’s attempts to undermine the election. “Donald Trump is a fascist,” he says. “And when it comes to democracy versus fascism, I’m sorry, there are not fine people on both sides. So, you need to choose: Donald Trump or the American people. This is the time to get off the Trump train, because he told you where the train is going, and it’s not a passenger train. And he’ll load you on it someday, too.”
“We’re not going to show you a second of what that sad, frightened fraud said tonight, because it’s poison, and I like you,” says the late-night show added. “He can suck silence.”
