Study

In the Last 6 Months, 99% of Late Night Comedy Guests Were Liberals

January 8th, 2025 3:00 PM

From the beginning of June through the end of December, the late night comedy shows welcomed 120 liberal guests and only one conservative, according to a new NewsBusters study.

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Lydic, Fallon Attack Zuckerberg For Abandoning Fact-Checkers

January 8th, 2025 1:15 PM

The Daily Show’s host-of-the-week Desi Lydic and The Tonight Show’s Jimmy Fallon used their respective shows on Comedy Central and NBC on Wednesday to attack Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his decision to ditch the company’s relationship with fact-checking companies. As Lydic and Fallon tell it, if someone calls themselves a fact-checker, they must be an unbiased observer of…

Study

STUDY: 82 Percent Of Late Night Jokes Targeted Conservatives In 2024

January 7th, 2025 12:35 PM

After a strike-shortened 2023, 2024 was a busy year for the late night comedians. During the last year, the men of late night told a total of 13,676 political jokes, of which 11,226, or 82 percent, were directed at someone or something on the right side of the political aisle, an MRC study has found.

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How Late-Night Comics Covered Up Biden’s Decline

January 4th, 2025 1:30 PM

Now, it can be told. President Joe Biden wasn’t capable of discharging his duties as Commander in Chief for large swathes of his single-term presidency. New reporting from The Wall Street Journal shared some, but not all, of the shocking details.

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'F*** The Norms' Vs. 'Crimes': Comedians Struggle With Hunter Pardon

December 3rd, 2024 10:15 AM

The men of late night comedy struggled on their Monday shows to reconcile their support for President Joe Biden and his decision to pardon his son, Hunter. Some hosts decided to make the story about Republicans, while others made more “Biden is old” quips, while others welcomed the news, but hoped Democrats would apply the logic behind it to ordinary people too.

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'What The Actual F***, America?' Comedy Shows Struggle With Trump Win

November 7th, 2024 12:00 PM

The six late night comedy shows vacillated between liberal pep talks, sadness, and anger on Wednesday as most of them reacted to Donald Trump’s presidential election victory. From asking “What the actual [bleep], America?” to mourning the demise of democracy, here is a Notable Quotables-style compliation of Wednesday’s tapings of Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel…

Study

No Laughing Matter: 98% of ‘Comedy’ Show Campaign Jokes Target Trump

October 30th, 2024 9:20 AM

During the fall presidential campaign, a Media Research Center study found that hosts of the late-night "comedy" shows told a total of 1,463 jokes about Donald Trump and Kamala Harris -- but 1,428 of them were about Trump, and only 35 were about Harris. That's a whopping 40:1 ratio or almost 98 percent to 2 percent.

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'No ****': Comedy Shows Go All In On Kelly Calling Trump a Fascist

October 24th, 2024 10:36 AM

Former Trump chief of staff John Kelly has a habit of being the go-to source for those seeking tantalizing anti-Trump stories, even as other former Trump administration officials who have soured on him cast doubt on them. However, for the men of late night comedy on Wednesday, if an anti-Trump story confirms their pre-existing biases, it must be true.

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Hillary, Fallon Promote 'Exciting' Harris Campaign

September 20th, 2024 10:00 AM

NBC’s Jimmy Fallon welcomed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Thursday’s taping of the Tonight Show to promote her new book and essentially rename the show the Kamala Harris Promotion Show.

The Incredible Shrinking Late-Night Lineup

September 14th, 2024 1:30 PM

Johnny Carson wouldn’t recognize today’s “Tonight Show.”

Study

Hyping Harris: Late Night Comedy's DNC Coverage Goes Soft

August 23rd, 2024 12:08 PM

For the late night comedy shows, the week of the Democratic National Convention provides the hosts with an opportunity to prove that they can make fun of Democrats in the same way they attack Republicans. However, a new MRC study shows they failed to do so this past week. In terms of quantity, the comedians hold 113 fewer jokes than they did during the RNC and 60 fewer jokes about Kamala…

Study

Comedy Shows Smear Republicans As Racist Cultists During RNC

July 19th, 2024 12:15 PM

It was a week of ridiculing Republicans for the men of late night comedy. From Monday to Thursday, the comedians attacked Republicans as racist, cult-like drones and told more jokes about VP-nominee JD Vance in one week than they have about current VP Kamala Harris all year.

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Late Night Freaks Out Over Biden's Debate Performance

July 9th, 2024 11:04 AM

After a couple of weeks of vacation, the full slate of late night comedy shows returned on Monday to reveal their reactions to President Joe Biden’s poor debate performance and subsequent interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos. While nobody called for Biden to step aside, there were definitely calls for him to step up his game because democracy is allegedly at stake.

Study

Late Night DNC: 94 Percent of Late Night Guests Are Liberal

July 2nd, 2024 10:00 AM

In the nine months since the end of the writers’ strike, the late night comedy shows have remained remarkably consistent, as a NewsBusters study determined 94 percent of their political guests have been liberal.