Late night hosts roast Trump's White House return, from his balcony scene to the 'strongman propaganda'

Late night hosts on Trump coming home with COVID
(Image credit: Screenshots/YouTube/The Late Show, Jimmy Kimmel Live, The Late Late Show, The Tonight Show)

"After spending four days in the hospital, last night President Trump arrived back at the White House — and it was quite a scene," Jimmy Fallon said on Tuesday's Tonight Show. Climbing 22 stairs then ripping off his mask is "the craziest thing he's ever done on that balcony, and that's the same place where he looked straight into an eclipse."

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Trump's balcony scene "was quite a spectacle," but "I gotta say, he might have left the hospital too early," Late Night's Seth Meyers said. "Usually when people breathe like that, it's right before they ask you if you have a cat."

"Trump wanted this to be a show of strength, but moments after taking off his mask, he was clearly struggling to breathe," Stephen Colbert said at The Late Show. Every bit of his flamboyant return "was just pure strongman propaganda," and "it really seemed like it was propaganda when they released it as propaganda." But Trump is showing signs of normalcy, he said, probably because "he is jacked to the nards on the steroid dexamethasone. Steroids can make you feel invincible."

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Dexamethasone also has stranger side effects, too, The Late Show illustrated with help from the "psychosis goldfish."

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"Typhoid Donny" is clearly "all hopped up on dexamethasone," since "only an egomaniac on massive amounts of drugs would ever even think to stage" that "dramatic balcony scene," Jimmy Kimmel said on Kimmel Live. But "did you notice how when it was his life in danger, he didn't consult that crazy doctor he retweeted who said COVID came from demon sperm, he didn't pop hydroxychloroquine or inject bleach or bring Diamond and Silk in to sass the virus away. No, he relied on science to save him. Let's not forget that that: When the man wanted to save his own life, he went straight to science, he had 10 doctors pumping his body with every drug available — and we paid for it. I'd say he got his $750 worth of tax money."

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"At least now we know how Trump is going to try to spin this whole episode," Trevor Noah said at The Daily Show. "It's not that he was so reckless and ignorant that he got himself and possibly many other people dangerously sick, it's that as a leader, he was brave enough to confront the virus head on."

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The Late Late Show's James Corden turned Trump's "maybe I'm invincible" boast into a Paul McCartney song. Watch below. Peter Weber

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.