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source_url: https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2020/feb/07/jimmy-kimmel-trump-impeachment-pettysburg-address
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Jimmy Kimmel
Donald Trump was in a celebratory, vindictive mood on the day after the Senate acquitted him of impeachment charges, as “the only person who would celebrate almost being thrown out of the White House”, said [Jimmy Kimmel](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/jimmy-kimmel). Earlier on Thursday, Trump attended the National Prayer Breakfast to offer what Kimmel called his “Pettysburg Address” – a rambling, boastful speech shouting out Republican allies and punching at imagined enemies.
Top of his hitlist was Mitt Romney, the only Republican to vote to convict him in the trial. “This tells you all you need to know about the president’s party: within hours of Romney’s vote, Trump tweeted a fully produced video attacking him, like presidents do,” said Kimmel.
Trump also brought up Hunter Biden, to make, according to Kimmel, “what might be his most ridiculous statement yet” – jabs at the Bidens for nepotism and corruption, using his children as counter-examples. Kimmel found the comparison laughable – “The idea that Donald Trump would criticize anyone for any kind of nepotism … he put his son-in-law in charge of peace in the Middle East! His kids are the poster children of political privilege.”
Meanwhile, Donald Trump Jr – “so desperate for Daddy’s love”, said Kimmel – posted a picture of Romney in jeans on Instagram with the caption “Mom Jeans, because you’re a p***y.”
“If Mitt Romney really was that, your father would’ve grabbed him by now,” Kimmel said.
Stephen Colbert
On the Late Show, [Stephen Colbert](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/stephen-colbert) continued to process the end of impeachment. “So what now?” he asked. “Some people fear that now there’s going to be nothing to hold him back – Trump unleashed, off the rails.”
First of all, “that’s not a leash, that’s just a very long tie,” he said. And second, “there were never rails! Not even those little bumpers they put in for kids to bowl. Nothing! So Trump’s not going to change.”
Case in point: on Thursday morning, Trump “began his toxic victory shamble” at the National Prayer Breakfast, attended by every president since the tradition began in 1953. “You know what they say,” said Colbert, “the Prayer Breakfast is the angriest meal of the day.”
Trump condemned perceived enemies, hyped his impeachment “victory” and flouted the event’s theme of forgiveness in a performance that was “so inappropriate that even Fox News summed it up as ‘Trump Slams Opponents At National Prayer Breakfast’”, said Colbert. “That is the worst presidential headline since ‘Nixon Drop-Kicks Baby Panda at National Zoo’.”
Trump then moved on to another press briefing in the White House, where he called the Russia investigation “all bullshit”.
“I would like to point out that for you people at home, we had to bleep that last word,” said Colbert, “because CBS has higher standards than the president of the United States.”
As usual, Trump defended his 25 July phone call with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in which he promised aid and then said, “I’d like you to do us a favor, though,” as a “very good phone call. I know bad phone calls.”
“Oh I’m sure you do, Mr President,” Colbert said, then imitated Trump: “They always start with ‘I swear I’ve never met her before,’ and they end with ‘OK, where do I sign the check?’”
Seth Meyers
On Late Night, [Seth Meyers](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/seth-meyers) also discussed Trump’s bizarre address at the National Prayer Breakfast, “because what is prayer if not a time to air petty grievances?”
As for his White House address, which was just as convoluted and petty, Meyers called it a “rambling non-speech fever dream or whatever the hell it was” which was “really just a showcase for our perpetually aggrieved and wounded president to nurse his ego, relive old glories and lash out at random critics and shadowy imagined opponents”.
Trump’s vocabulary orbited around “a few insane phrases in particular,” said Meyers, such as “dirty cops”, “leakers” and “liars”.
“Is he whining about impeachment or narrating a movie trailer?” Meyers wondered, imitating the president: “It was the bad ones, the leakers, the liars, the dirty cops, and the only one who could take them down was Serpi-dope.”
Meyers hoped the two addresses serve as “a reminder to everyone who thought Trump had somehow managed to restrain himself during the State of the Union two days ago – the Trump we saw today was the real Trump”.
It’s also going to be the Trump of the next nine months, “because it’s pretty clear from his vengeful, celebratory tone that Trump wanted this to be the week that, for all intents and purposes, he kicked off his 2020 re-election campaign,” said Meyers. “Although I don’t know if Trump ever really stopped campaigning – he spends more time in arenas than Jon Bon Jovi.”