Late-night hosts snicker at President Donald Trump on a nearly daily basis in 2018 — and on Tuesday, they were joined by world leaders.
In a much-reported moment, after Trump told the U.N. General Assembly in a speech that “in almost two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in our country,” his remark were met by laughter in the audience. “Didn’t expect that reaction,” the president then told the audience, “but that’s OK.”
The moment struck several commentators as ironic, given that during his 2016 presidential campaign Trump often charged that the country needed a leader who wasn’t a “laughing stock,” as he tweeted in 2014.
On The Late Show, host Stephen Colbert joked, “Don’t worry, Mr. President, they’re not laughing at you. They’re laughing with each other at you.”
Earlier, Colbert remarked on how Trump was so late to the speech that the Ecuadorean president took his place in the sequence of speeches. “C’mon man, you’re from New York. You know what the traffic is like when the U.N. is here,” he said. “Just take the subway. I know it smells like pee, but rumor is you like that.” (Colbert was referring to reports of a so-called “pee tape” reported to date back to Trump’s stay in Moscow in 2013).
Over on NBC’s Late Night, host Seth Meyers recapped the moment with a jab at the president: “That’s right, President Trump claimed that he has accomplished more than any other president in history, and world leaders in the audience laughed. Though technically they were still laughing from when he said, ‘Hello, I’m the president of the United States,'” Meyers joked.
Meanwhile, on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Jimmy Kimmel likened the speech to “when your alcoholic uncle grabs the microphone at your wedding. No good can come of it,” he said.
Kimmel particularly took issue with the point in Trump’s speech when he complained of not receiving any foreign aid (“The U.S. is the largest giver in the world by far, but few give anything to us,” Trump said).
“Yeah! Where’s our foreign aid, Ethiopia? How about you share some of those lentils for a change?” Kimmel joked.
The Tonight Show‘s Jimmy Fallon took a shot at the White House’s approach to foreigners in his bit on the U.N. talk: “Halfway through the speech, everyone was begging to be deported,” he joked.
Of the U.N.’s response to his line about his administration’s success, Fallon said, “Trump hasn’t heard that much laughter since his night with Stormy Daniels.”
And on Conan, Conan O’Brien took an on-brand, foreign policy-centric approach to his joke. “At the U.N. today, President Trump told world leaders that his administration has accomplished more than any in U.S. history, and the whole audience laughed. Trump was furious because for a few seconds he accidentally made some foreigners happy,” he said.
