Stephen Colbert returned from vacation on Tuesday and during his monologue talked about the story that occupied everyone over Labor Day weekend: Trump’s health.
Though Colbert wasn’t thrilled about the idea of a president dying in office, he didn’t think the White House’s efforts over the weekend to demonstrate that Trump was, in fact, alive, were very convincing. In particular, the blurry images reminded Colbert of the infamous blurry photos purported to be of bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster.
“I was shocked to learn that this weekend, the biggest story was frenzied social media rumors speculating whether Donald Trump had died,” Colbert began. “For the record, Donald Trump is very much alive, okay.”
At this, the “Late Show” audience started booing, a reaction Colbert gently shushed. “No, we like our presidents alive,” he said.
“Donald Trump is very much alive, and this whole crazy rumor started simply because Trump had zero events on his schedule, Wednesday, Thursday or Friday,” Colbert continued, “and one of the only signs that he might still be around was music heard in the Rose Garden, which the White House confirmed was the President’s music. Which I got to say, is not the strongest proof of life. Yes, nurse, I do see that flat line, but the patient is clearly alive because his iPhone is playing ‘Papa loves Mambo. Papa loves Mambo.’”
“Anyway because he was out of public view, and because, when he is in public view, eww, the internet went crazy. ‘Is Trump dead?’ and ‘Trump dead’ were among the top searches on Google, while the top search on Bing was as always, ‘where find Google?’” Colbert joked.
“Adding to all this terrible, morbid speculation, on Thursday, Vice President JD Vance spoke to the USA Today, and here’s how he answered the question, ‘are you ready to assume the role of Commander in Chief if needed?’”
Colbert then ran a clip of Vance’s answer, which was: “The President is in incredibly good health. He’s got incredible energy. And while most of the people who work around the president united states are younger than he is, I think that we find that he actually is the last person who goes to sleep. He’s the last person making phone calls at night.”
“The President doesn’t sleep and is on the phone all night, proof that he is completely healthy or runs a phone sex line,” Colbert said. He then did an impression of Trump conducting phone sex, which included a very funny joke about the president’s recent cankle problem.
“On Saturday, the rumors took another hit when this footage was released at the White House entrance,” Colbert went on, showing said clip. “Because that blurry, faraway shot of a lumbering hominid is definitely Donald Trump.”
“For More proof, the White House also released a photo of Trump swimming in a Scottish Loch,” he added.
There’s a lot more, and you can watch the full monologue below:
