Stephen Colbert opened Thursday’s Late Show with a celebration of the new US moon mission – “I’ve got moon madness!” he exclaimed – but after a bit on reported toilet trouble onboard Artemis II, he turned to more pressing Earth-bound matters. “Speaking of human waste, just a few hours ago we learnt that President Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi,” he told the audience at the Ed Sullivan Theater.
“Now listen, in tribute to Pam Bondi, I offer this heartfelt farewell …” he added, pulling out a letter that began “Dear Pam”, followed by paragraphs of blacked-out text and the sign off: “Sincerely, Stephen Colbert” – a reference to the many, many redactions of the Epstein files that Bondi oversaw as attorney general.
Bondi lost her job because Trump was reportedly upset over her handling of the said files, a dark cloud which still hangs over his administration. But “saying that the villain of the Epstein files is Pam Bondi is like saying the lead in Die Hard is the dad from Family Matters,” Colbert joked.
As Trump wrote on Truth Social: “Pam Bondi is a Great American Patriot and a loyal friend, who faithfully served as my Attorney General over the past year. Pam did a tremendous job overseeing a massive crackdown in Crime across our Country, with Murders plummeting to their lowest level since 1900. We love Pam, and she will be transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector, to be announced at a date in the near future.”
Colbert zeroed in on the “private sector” bit, and broke out his Trump impression: “It’s a much-needed job at a very important farm upstate,” he joked. “There’ll be lots of room for her to run around. Unfortunately, we can’t go visit her. Now let’s go to the strip mall and get you a new attorney general, buddy.”
“OK, I’ve put it off long enough,” he added, before finally addressing Trump’s Wednesday night primetime address on his military actions in Iran. “It was all the stuff you’ve heard before but now delivered by a narcotized turtle,” the host explained. “The speech was billed as a major update on the month-long war, but the only real information he offered was that other wars lasted longer.”
As Trump put it: “It’s very important that we keep this conflict in perspective. American involvement in World War I lasted one year, seven months and five days.” Trump then went on to list the runtime of every US war since then.
“Frasier went on for 11 years,” Colbert facetiously added. “Suddenly Susan was only four years, two days and three box tops. Sex and the City was six years unless you count … And Just Like That, which personally I don’t because my Miranda would never leave Steve.”
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