Late night hosts debate Trump's rush to reopen the economy, and the protesters nudging him along

"Last month alone, 22 million Americans have been laid off — and unfortunately, Donald Trump is not one of them," Stephen Colbert said on Thursday's Late Show. Trump's aspiration to reopen the country by May 1 "might be a tad premature, because all the experts agree there needs to be extensive coronavirus testing before people can return to work."

Trump said last week he doesn't think we need to do testing, but the business leaders he named to economic-revival councils Tuesday — sometimes without informing them beforehand — told him otherwise. And Trump isn't the only one eager to restart the economy, regardless of the costs. Angry "pro-Trump protesters" gathered outside the Ohio statehouse and choked the streets of Michigan's capital this week to demand the governors reopen business, Colbert said. The Michigan event especially "had the feel of a free-floating Trump rally. Protesters carried Trump flags, MAGA signs, even Confederate flags — because nothing says 'never surrender' like a Confederate flag."

"And if you're wondering why, specifically, these people are so angry that they would gather and risk extending this pandemic," Jimmy Kimmel said, it's access to lawn fertilizer and hair salons. "The real problem" with making people shelter at home "is you can't make Americans do anything, we just won't," he said. "If you tell us to do something, we won't do it. We only exist because someone tried to make us pay extra for tea once."

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The flip side of that is "you just can't make people go to restaurants or stores because you want them to," Late Night's Seth Meyers pointed out. "You gonna have federal agents knock on people's doors and force them to go to the Olive Garden?" In a Politico poll this week, "more than eight in 10 voters, 81 percent, say that Americans should continue to social-distance for as long as is needed to curb the spread of coronavirus, even if it means continued damage to the economy," he said. So while "Trump seems intent on reopening the economy by the end of the month, even though he doesn't have the power to do that and public health experts have warned against it," he doesn't have the tools to make that happen.

The Daily Show's Trevor Noah looks at all the coronavirus conspiracy theories — well, not all of them. Watch below. Peter Weber