On CBS’s Tuesday night broadcast of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, former Daily Show host Jon Stewart used his hard-left comedy to mock Donald Trump’s presidency as a “giant turd asteroid” that Stewart is glad to have avoided covering.
Tuesday’s pre-taped show featured a series of “interviews” of Colbert by celebrity guests — including Stewart — but Colbert frequently switched to the role of host to throw back questions at his guests. This was precisely what prompted Stewart’s “turd business” commentary.
“Do you miss at all having a show that deals with these kind of jokes now that [Trump]'s President of the United States, ‘cause you’re like, ah, that would be nice to take a couple of swipes here or there, no?” Colbert asked.
Stewart and Colbert then immediately started going back and forth joking about their families being “poor Appalachian turd miners”:
STEWART: You and I both famously know, we were turd miners. We toiled in the turd mines.
COLBERT: We grew up in Appalachia.
STEWART: We grew up in Appalachia.
COLBERT: We were poor Appalachian turd miners.
STEWART: That’s right.
COLBERT: We came from a family, a family of turd -- well, you know, my family, back in the old country they were goat ball lickers. That was -- turd mining was a step up.
At this point, Stewart compared Trump to “a giant turd asteroid” and explained why he was happy not having to continue hosting the Daily Show, which he already saw as “toiling in the turd mines” during Barack Obama and George W. Bush’s presidencies [emphasis mine]:
STEWART: But we both lost many people close to us to Turd Lung. It's been a -- it's been a terrible thing. So, working at The Daily Show, I was -- I felt as though I was toiling in the turd mines. And then I finally quit, and a giant turd asteroid...
[laughter]
…heads towards the planet.
[cheers and applause]
Now, in that instance, if someone said: "Hey, you were a turd miner. This is the largest turd deposit ever seen. Don't you wish you were in there?" And you're just like: "I'm out of the turd business. I’m out."
Colbert responded to Stewart by joking that he should jump back into the pool of political commentary: “Come on in, Jon. The turd's fine.” After laughing raucously, Stewart closed the segment for a commercial break.
A fuller transcript of the above-described segment follows below:
11:44 PM EST
STEPHEN COLBERT: You famously -- you gave him-- a lot of people have nicknames for Donald Trump, but you have the greatest nickname of all time. Would you care to share it with the people of the CBS audience?
JON STEWART: I refer to him as F*ckface von Clownstick.
[laughter]
Let me say this-- affectionately. Always affectionately.
COLBERT: I know I’m being interviewed right now.
STEWART: Always with respect.
COLBERT: I know I’m interview [sic] right now.
STEWART: Yes you are.
COLBERT: Can I ask you-
STEWART: Yes.
COLBERT: Do you -- do you miss at all having a show that deals with these kind of jokes now that he's President of the United States, ‘cause you’re like, ah, that would be nice to take a couple of swipes here or there, no?
STEWART: You and I both famously know, we were turd miners. We toiled in the turd mines.
COLBERT: We grew up in Appalachia.
STEWART: We grew up in Appalachia.
COLBERT: We were poor Appalachian turd miners.
STEWART: That’s right.
COLBERT: We came from a family, a family of turd -- well, you know, my family, back in the old country they were goat ball lickers. That was -- turd mining was a step up. Turd mining was a step up for them.
STEWART: But we both lost many people close to us to Turd Lung. It's been a -- it's been a terrible thing. So, working at The Daily Show, I was -- I felt as though I was toiling in the turd mines. And then I finally quit, and a giant turd asteroid...
[laughter]
…heads towards the planet.
[cheers and applause]
Now, in that instance, if someone said: "Hey, you were a turd miner. This is the largest turd deposit ever seen. Don't you wish you were in there?" And you're just like: "I'm out of the turd business. I’m out."
[laughter]
COLBERT: Come on in, Jon. The turd's fine.
[applause]
