Jimmy Kimmel‘s fellow late night hosts playfully poked fun at his recent drama with President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump.
Ahead of Stephen Colbert’s final episode of The Late Show, five late night hosts gathered during the Monday, May 11, broadcast. Colbert, 61, asked the group whether they ever thought about the president having “strong feelings” about their programming.
“You know what’s even weirder? Doing a job that his wife has strong feelings about,” Kimmel, 58, said, as Seth Meyers joked, “Most of us have avoided that part.”
John Oliver, meanwhile, recalled the way Kimmel initially responded to the drama.
“It’s an amazing thing to get a text from Jimmy saying, ‘Oh, boy,’ and then a picture of Melania mad at him. What a way to start the day!” Oliver, 49, quipped.
Jimmy Fallon said he had an unexpected reaction, adding, “And then I sent a text to you guys, and I said, ‘Hey, don’t be mad at me, but I liked it.’ I think she’s got a point.”
Kimmel recently made headlines for a monologue on his late night show which featured a 10-minute roast about the president ahead of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Kimmel joked that Melania, 56, has a “glow like an expectant widow.”
The comedian was subsequently slammed by Melania and Donald, 79, after a shooting took place at the Washington, D.C. event in April. Melania described the joke as “hateful and violent rhetoric” that “is intended to divide our country,” while her husband called to have Kimmel fired.
“We’re all kind of happy when you get in trouble over there, and how do you feel when you wake up, and you see the attention?” Colbert asked Kimmel, who replied, “The saddest part of it is that I realize in those moments that the only four people who care are sitting right here.”
Kimmel added: “It takes 12 hours for the rest of the people in my life to even figure out that anything’s going on.”
The five late night hosts came together in honor of Colbert’s final episode of The Late Show, which will air on Thursday, May 21.
When CBS announced in July 2025 that The Late Show was ending, the news was met with immediate backlash. Network executives then released a statement addressing their decision, claiming it was not “related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount” but was instead due to finances.
Some were still skeptical about the move, since it came after an episode where Colbert spoke out about Paramount, CBS’ parent company, settling what he called “a nuisance lawsuit” brought by Donald. In his lawsuit, the president alleged that 60 Minutes had unfairly edited an interview of Kamala Harris.
“I do not dispute their rationale [that it was for financial reasons],” Colbert told The New York Times in April when asked about viewers who are skeptical over the reason for his late night talk show coming to an end. “I do make jokes about it.”
The comedian said he could see both sides of the argument.
“But I also completely understand why people would say (A) that doesn’t make sense to me and (B) that seems fishy to me,” he noted. “Because the network did it to themselves by bending the knee to the Trump administration over a $20 billion, settled for $16 million, completely frivolous lawsuit.”
