Jimmy Kimmel on Trump's coronavirus plan: 'Phase one: open the golf courses'
Late-night hosts criticised Trump’s plan to restart the economy too soon and addressed some of the Covid-19 conspiracy theories circulating.
Jimmy Kimmel
On Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the host started with pictures of the protest in Michigan where angry citizens, many of them wearing Trump hats, expressed displeasure over the lockdown.
“The real problem is you can’t make Americans do anything,” Kimmel said. “We just won’t. We only exist because someone tried to make us pay extra for tea once.”
Trump has also been talking about reopening businesses within weeks. “He is determined to reopen this country like a bankrupt casino,” he quipped.
But after claiming he had total authority over the states, he is now allowing governors to decide when to end enforced quarantining. “In three days he went from ‘I call the shots’ to ‘You do you’,” he joked.
Trump has unveiled a plan, which Kimmel summarised. “Phase one: open the golf courses,” he said. “Phase two: open hotels that rhyme with Hump. And number three: all restaurants that serve food in buckets or in the form of nuggets are good to go.”
Stephen Colbert
On The Late Show, Stephen Colbert mentioned that 22 million Americans have lost their jobs since the pandemic started and “unfortunately Donald Trump is not one of them”.
He spoke about Trump holding “another coronavirus blame-and-shout” where he spoke about guidelines for reopening the economy. He listed a number of figures who would be part of a council to figure out the specifics yet many of them were only made aware of their inclusion when he said their names on TV.
“Why start asking for consent now?” Colbert joked.
He continued: “That’s kind of like finding out you’re engaged by getting a save the date card to your own wedding.”
Colbert also joked that Trump is “at least halfway to dictator because he is being a dick” before mentioning a resurfaced plan that suggested Trump wanted to host a daily two-hour radio show from the White House.
“Could we just lock him in a soundproof room for two hours a day and just tell him he’s on the radio?” he joked.
He also spoke about the recent protests, such as one that aimed to gridlock the streets. “Who are you gridlocking? There’s nobody else out there,” he said.
He added: “Nothing says never surrender like a Confederate flag.”
Trevor Noah
On The Daily Show, Trevor Noah posed a question many people have been asking: “Where in the hell did this disease come from?”
He then went through some of the theories that have been circulating, including one that suggested it was from bat soup in Wuhan, “a theory people were willing to accept because of racism”.
But after that was debunked he moved on to another, pushed by Roseanne Barr, that it was manmade to get rid of old people. “As soon as people started saying ‘OK boomer’ all of a sudden we’ve got coronavirus and old people are dying? That can’t be a coincidence!” he joked.
Noah added: “Maybe it’s because someone was tired of giving up their seat on the bus?”
But after that was also debunked he addressed the theory that 5G was at fault, a “ridiculous and biologically impossible” idea. “Saying 5G made you sick is sort of like saying an iPhone flashlight gave you sunburn,” he said.