Late-night hosts react to Trump’s return to office: ‘Too weird to be real’

Late-night hosts Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Fallon reacted to President Trump’s return to the White House on Monday, describing the president being sworn in as a “long national nightmare.”

“I’m going to get to the news. Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and like Martin Luther King, I also had a dream. I mean, it had to be a dream, right?” Meyers said at the start of his NBC show, “Late Night.” “It’s too weird to be real,” he added. 

After joking about other headlines, Meyers said, “So, that’s it, right? We’re done with the news and we can move on now? Oh s—, right, Donald Trump’s now the president of the United States. Oh, yeah. Right, right. F— me!”

Meyers also opined on Trump’s speech, describing it as “An unsettling low-energy mix of ominous fascism and weird s–t that no one except Donald Trump and his minions even care about.”

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Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the United States on Monday. The late-night hosts, who mostly expressed support for former President Biden and former Vice President Kamala Harris, did not hold back in mocking the ceremony and the new president. 

On CBS’ “The Late Show,” Colbert said, “Well, ladies and gentlemen. It happened. Donald Trump is president again.”

“So, how, how, where do we begin? Off we go, first of all. Do you make sense of today? How did we get here?” Colbert added.

Fallon on NBC’s “Tonight Show” was met with boos after declaring, “Guys, today, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the United States.”

“We’re all united. That’s great to know,” he said, responding to the crowd’s reaction.

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Kimmel told a story on ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” about the beginning of his day, which included his son peeing in his bed and his dog pooping in the hallway, which he said was just an “appetizer” ahead of the inauguration.

“Today at noon eastern our long national nightmare was officially sworn in. Another time. A second time. Donald Trump became the first convicted felon to be sworn-in as president of the United States,” said Kimmel, a frequent critic of the president.

Kimmel said during an October interview that he was not “mentally prepared” for Vice President Kamala Harris potentially losing the election to former President Trump.

“I was telling my wife, I don’t feel like I’m mentally prepared for the possibility of a loss. I’m not ready. I have to get there where I’m ready for either scenario,” Kimmel said, speaking to MSNBC host Joe Scarborough, who wondered whether he looked forward to a time when they weren’t talking about Trump every single day.

“You’re going to have to be up the next morning talking about what happened or what didn’t happen and what message do you want to send to people who watch the show,” Kimmel continued. “Most of my shows aren’t important. That one seems a little bit more important than others because I do have a lot of people kind of asking me what I think and going along with what I think, and it’s a big responsibility,” he added.