Legendary comedian and newly minted podcast host David Steinberg compared Donald Trump to Richard Nixon — who used to send hecklers to Steinberg’s shows — in a new interview with TheWrap.
“Donald Trump’s more dangerous than just the little audience that I had where they were heckling me,” Steinberg said. “He could turn out to be wonderful. I don’t see it yet, but it might be there.”
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Steinberg was a frequent guest on “The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson.” Steinberg’s comedy often veered into the political realm, and he claims that Carson began getting calls about knocking off the political humor after Steinberg made several jokes about Nixon.
According to Steinberg, the problems didn’t stop with a few phone calls. He claims that Nixon hired hecklers to attend his shows and yell things when he did his Nixon jokes.
“I didn’t know they were hired by the President. I found out later because it would be the same two, three people,” he said. “And I wouldn’t see them, I would just hear these voices. A writer that I’ve been working with even to this day…would say, “It’s the same voice! It looks like it’s the same guy everywhere!” But they would only heckle when I would do the Nixon material.”