Jon Stewart devoted his Monday monologue on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show to accusing President Trump of being an authoritarian. However, some of Stewart’s examples of authoritarianism, such as protecting women’s sports and defunding public broadcasting, were woefully unimpressive. Additionally, Stewart alleged Trump had bungled “the authoritarian bargain” that requires competence in return for compliance, as he also suggested Trump is to blame for a series of plane crashes.
Stewart began with faux reverence for Trump, “President Trump. Generalissimo. Oh, great Moses. I don't know what your advisors have told you about the authoritarian bargain, but the basic deal is: the American people look the other way while you disappear undesirables, knuckle under the elites, ban all seven trans athletes from our nation's beloved NCAA fencing tournaments, you know, all the people that are holding us back, and then you, in turn, make shit work.”
Getting more animated, Stewart continued, “You want to ignore the Supreme Court and all the other courts and take away people's licenses to broadcast? Fine!”
Changing voice inflections again, Stewart squeaked, “But when the planes go up, they've got to come down, and not on fire. You don't even have to have them be on time.”
A bit later, Stewart equated not funding something with destroying it, “You want to destroy NPR and PBS, the Voice of America, sell the naming rights of the Washington Monument to Hims.com? Use the R-word, the P-word, the C-word, make up your own slurs? Have the United States Naval Academy remove Maya Angelou from its bookshelves, but for some reason, keep Mein Kampf, which is a real [bleep] thing that they did, we'll be fine!”
Stewart concluded with a reference to Vice President JD Vance’s Monday blooper, where he dropped the NCAA football championship trophy:
We weren't that crazy about this system of government in the first place. But you keep [bleep] this up, and some of these lawyers and universities and corporate leaders are going to start to think about suggesting, respectfully, to each other in a very tightly controlled text chat, that someone should reach out to someone who knows someone in your administration to express mild dissatisfaction. Because injustice anywhere is not something we mostly think about and remember, you don't have that much time to get it right because it's not like your Vice Authoritarian Butterfingers is inspiring any confidence.
It is also not as if Stewart’s broad definition of authoritarianism is inspiring any confidence in the liberal opposition either.
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Here is a transcript for the April 14 show:
Comedy Central The Daily Show
4/14/2025
11:17 PM ET
JON STEWART: President Trump. Generalissimo. Oh, great Moses. I don't know what your advisors have told you about the authoritarian bargain, but the basic deal is: the American people look the other way while you disappear undesirables, knuckle under the elites, ban all seven trans athletes from our nation's beloved NCAA fencing tournaments, you know, all the people that are holding us back, and then you, in turn, make shit work.
You want to ignore the Supreme Court and all the other courts and take away people's licenses to broadcast? Fine! But when the planes go up, they've got to come down, and not on fire. You don't even have to have them be on time. You can take over Greenland, demonize Canada, dominate the golfing pro circuit, but in return, our children should be somewhat safe from most Victorian-era diseases. We love our children. We love them. We love our children. Especially, the Rizzler.
You want to destroy NPR and PBS, the Voice of America, sell the naming rights of the Washington Monument to Hims.com? Use the R-word, the P-word, the C-word, make up your own slurs? Have the United States Naval Academy remove Maya Angelou from its bookshelves, but for some reason, keep Mein Kampf, which is a real [bleep] thing that they did, we'll be fine!
We weren't that crazy about this system of government in the first place. But you keep [bleep] this up, and some of these lawyers and universities and corporate leaders are going to start to think about suggesting, respectfully, to each other in a very tightly controlled text chat, that someone should reach out to someone who knows someone in your administration to express mild dissatisfaction. Because injustice anywhere is not something we mostly think about and remember, you don't have that much time to get it right because it's not like your Vice Authoritarian Butterfingers is inspiring any confidence.
