Late-night hosts discussed vague national security warnings and Donald Trump’s strange Valentine’s Day messages on Wednesday evening.
Stephen Colbert
Stephen Colbert opened his Valentine’s Day Late Show monologue by urging his audience not to panic, even though the Ohio congressman Mike Turner, the Republican chair of the House intelligence committee, released an unusual statement warning of a “serious national security threat” without providing any additional details.
“That’s unnecessarily vague,” said Colbert. “That’s like labeling a pack of cigarettes ‘surgeon general’s warning: trust me, you don’t wanna know.’”
Reports early in the day suggested that the threat was related to Russia. “Oh my God! Is it a bioweapon? Is it cyber-warfare? Are they sending Steven Seagal back?” Colbert wondered.
The White House said they planned to brief Congress on the threat on Thursday, “adding that they couldn’t do it today because they were a little busy stocking up on canned goods”, Colbert quipped.
Sources with access to highly classified information – “so, anyone who used the bathroom at Mar-a-Lago”, Colbert joked – reported that the threat was Russia wanting nuclear weapons in space. “But before you get too worried, the nukes would not be to drop a weapon on Earth from orbit, but to possibly use against satellites,” Colbert explained. “Which reminds me of that famous quote from Oppenheimer: ‘Now I am become death, destroyer of GPS. Find your own to Costco, suckers!’”
Still, “I cannot emphasize this enough: there is no reason to panic about that,” Colbert assured. “The only reason to panic is if you forgot it’s Valentine’s Day,” which is the same day as Ash Wednesday this year. “Which explains why the top gift at CVS this year was an adorable toy bear that says, ‘for dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return,’” Colbert joked.
Jimmy Kimmel
Jimmy Kimmel also riffed on a joint Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday, “which is confusing – I accidentally gave my priest chocolates and lingerie”, he joked.
Joe Biden posted a Valentine’s Day message to his wife Jill – “Jilly, you’re the love of my life and the life of my love.” “Which is sweet,” said Kimmel, “but also sounds like the riddle a troll would force you to solve to be allowed to cross the bridge.
“And you know what? Even Donald Trump posted a romantic message today,” Kimmel added. The ex-president wrote on Truth Social: “BIDEN IS NOT TOO OLD, HE’S TOO INCOMPETENT!”
“That’s as close as he gets to telling somebody he loves them,” Kimmel mused. And “the closest Trump got to a Valentine today was an email they sent to his supporters”.
The email opened with: “Dear Melania, I love you! Even after every single indictment, arrest, and witch hunt, you never left my side.”
“I think that’s a line from the Notebook, isn’t it?” Kimmel deadpanned. “What a lovely and romantic gesture.”
Seth Meyers
And on Late Night, Seth Meyers reminded his viewers about the disgraced former congressman George Santos – “you remember George Santos? Congressman, alleged felon, Sephora platinum member, Nobel laureate, Olympic gold medalist, Clark Kent having an allergic reaction and Super Bowl MVP?”
Following his historic removal from Congress, his district on Long Island held a special election for his replacement this week, and voters “had nothing but negative things to say about him”.
To quote one voter: “I think he needs help because he’s delusional.”
“And when a Long Islander says you’re delusional it stings, because they’re mostly Jets fans,” Meyers quipped.
The victor of the race, the Democrat Tom Suozzi, openly distanced himself from Joe Biden. “The polls are bad for Biden right now,” Meyers explained, “so much so that Democrats want him around as much as teens partying in the basem*nt want to see their dad.”
The Republican, Mazi Pilip, embraced Trump on the campaign trail but was rejected by him in defeat. Posting on Truth Social following her loss, Trump called Pilip a “very foolish woman” and said: “MAGA, which is most of the Republican Party, stayed home – and it always will, unless it is treated with the respect that it deserves. I stayed out of the race, ‘I want to be loved!’ Give us a real candidate in the district for November. Suozzi, I know him well, can be easily beaten!”
The “I want to be loved” line tripped up some CNN reporters. “Maybe it’s a desperate plea from a man bereft of human attention? Human affection on the eve of Valentine’s Day?” Meyers theorized.
“What I’m saying is, ‘I want to be loved’ is the subtext of everything Trump has said or ever done,” he added. “The only way it could be clearer is if he added ‘by my father’ to the end of it. His campaign slogan might as well be: ‘Trump 2024: Daddy, watch me dive!’”
