Late Night Hosts Weigh In on Michael Cohen’s “Eventful” Testimony

Late night hosts predictably picked apart Michael Cohen’s harsh testimony about his experience with Donald Trump to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform on Wednesday night’s shows.

Trump’s former personal attorney and fixer said in prepared testimony to Congress on Wednesday that Trump was a “racist,” a “con man” and a “cheat” who knew about WikiLeaks’ plan to release emails from the Democratic National Committee server, though Trump has denied that he did. Cohen additionally said he had heard the president make remarks “disparaging African-Americans, saying at one point that black people would never vote for him because they were too stupid.”

On The Daily Show on Wednesday, host Trevor Noah reflected on Trump’s alleged comments about why black people “would never” vote for him. “No, Donald, black people would never vote for you because of your trash-ass weave,” Noah joked. “Look at that thing. What is that? Where did you get it from?”

Noah then commented on the staccato nature of Cohen’s opening statement. “Damn, that was one hell of an opening statement. Especially the part where he started speaking like the Riddler,” Noah said. “Just like, ‘Who is kind but not kind? Bald but also blond? His hands are tiny, but he can grab an entire pussy. Who is he?'”

Over on Late Night, host Seth Meyers focused his “Closer Look” segment on the disbarred lawyer. “We say this a lot, but today was truly one of the most eventful days of the Trump presidency,” Meyers began. “It’s not often that you have one of the president’s closest personal confidants testify before Congress about their relationship.”

He went on to note that Republicans were “freaking out” about Cohen’s testimony in advance, pointing out that one such Republican, Congressman Matt Gaetz, “tried to intimidate Cohen on Twitter by threatening to reveal sensitive personal information.”

Meyers referenced Gaetz’s tweet, which asked Cohen, “Do your wife and father-in-law know about your girlfriends?” in addition to remarking, “I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison.” Said Meyers, “I didn’t think anyone could out-sleaze Donald Trump, but you did it, my friend.”

Talking about Cohen’s hearing before Congress, Meyers said the former lawyer “wasted no time going after Trump clearly and directly in his statement,” listing Trump’s “alleged crimes and personal failings” along with a claim that Trump took the presidency for selfish purposes and “never wanted to make this country great.” Referencing the fact that Trump is currently in Vietnam, Meyers said, “It’s so ironic: Trump finally went to Vietnam and he’s getting killed back home.”

On TBS, Conan O’Brien had fun with NBC’s coverage of the testimony. He noted that the network provided graphics that allowed viewers to see information about a representative every time they spoke. “I noticed that as the hearing went on and on, the stats became less useful, less helpful,” he said. The late night host then joked about Rep. Mark Green’s stats, which he said were “yellow belt in Taekwondo; disowned his son for listening to rap; once referred to salad as “french fries for gays.”

For fellow Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, O’Brien joked that his infographic read: “Gluten- and immigrant-intolerant; apartment has over 47 wall-punch holes; once put his penis into a warm pita pocket.”

“Yeah, well, I can’t really cast a stone at him,” O’Brien joked.

On Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Kimmel joked, “It was a historic hearing — right from the beginning Michael Cohen delivered an opening statement that somehow managed to mention both the Holocaust and a porn star. And we were off to the races from there.”

Kimmel mentioned that Cohen said he served the president because being around him was “intoxicating.”

“But not in a bottle-of-wine kind of way — more of a cocktails-with-[Bill]-Cosby type of thing,” Kimmel joked. The late night host also took issue with the fact that “the vast majority” of Republicans “seemed to have no interest whatsoever in learning whether or not the president committed a crime.”

“See, if I was president and I was accused of something I swore I didn’t do? I would want a full investigation. I would want them to ask real questions,” Kimmel said. “But instead they were behaving like they had this image of Trump raging around his hotel room in his underpants watching them on TV, so they had to make a stand.”

He joked that “Nixon must be so jealous of these guys,” adding, “It was quite a show of outrage and bluster. I tell you, I haven’t seen acting from Republicans like this since Arnold Schwarzenegger in Jingle All the Way.”

Over on The Tonight Show, Jimmy Fallon recapped Cohen’s testimony for his audience.

After the host explained that Cohen called the president a con man, cheat and racist, he said, “Trump heard that and he was like, ‘Great, now I need a new 2020 campaign slogan and a new Tinder bio.”‘

While the testimony aired on many TV channels, it was also available to watch in Russia. “You know it’s crazy when even Vladimir Putin is like, ‘Pass the popcorn,'” continued Fallon.

The host later touched on Cohen’s claims that Trump said his son Donald Jr. had “the worst judgment of anyone in the world.” Fallon added, “In response, Don Jr. was like, ‘Dad talked about me?'”

Also during the testimony, Cohen shared a check that he said Trump used to pay him back for Stormy Daniels’ hush money. Fallon joked that he shared other checks from the president, including one to pay a private investigator to find out who the Masked Singer was and to take Eric and Don Jr. to Six Flags and to leave them at the amusement park.