Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel think Mike Pence's fly probably won the vice presidential debate


Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) met Wednesday night for the first and only vice presidential debate. "This debate is important, because one of these people could be our president someday — for Mike Pence, the day could be tomorrow," Jimmy Kimmel said on Wednesday's Kimmel Live. "Safety was a concern leading up to tonight's debate, seeing as how the White House is now the new Wuhan."
So once the debate started, Kimmel said, "the plexi went up and the gloves came off. I wish Kamala would have started the debate by congratulating Mike Pence on his great work as leader of the COVID task force — and then just laughed like a maniac for 90 minutes." He ran through some of the bigger moments.
"A lot of people noticed that Mike Pence had a pink eye, which is apparently a symptom of coronavirus," Kimmel said. "But the big star of the debate tonight was a fly that landed, quite symbolically, on the vice president's head" — and "stayed on his head for 2 minutes and 3 seconds. Technically, that fly is now his running mate. But anyway, Mike Pence's fly just became the most popular Halloween costume of 2020." Look, he said, "no one's mind was changed tonight, almost none of the questions were answered."
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Yes, the debate "was everything we expected," Stephen Colbert said on The Late Show: "Pence talked over all the women in the room, the moderator tried to call for order, the vice president got a couple of good licks in, and Sen. Harris picked up a broken pool cue and beat Pence over the head with the Trump administration's failures. All night, Pence wouldn't give one straight answer — which is kind of weird, because normally he likes everything straight. It wasn't earth-shattering, but that is how politics should be, remember?"
"Oh, there is one moment that stuck with me," Colbert said. "You'll know it when you see it — everyone's buzzing about it." But before he got to Pence's hair fly, he ran through some key exchanges and mocked Pence's "insane equivalency" between COVID-19 and the 2009 swine flu outbreak, when, he deadpanned, "the economy shut down for a year, we couldn't hug our grandparents for months, and Barack Obama would not shut up about the MyPillow guy." Finally, he landed his fly jokes. Watch below. Peter Weber
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
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.
-
September 1 editorial cartoons
Cartoons Monday’s political cartoons include Labor Day picnic, branding strategy, and more
-
What is Tony Blair's plan for Gaza?
Today's Big Question Former PM has reportedly been putting together a post-war strategy 'for the past several months'
-
When does autumn begin?
The Explainer The UK is experiencing a 'false autumn', as climate change shifts seasonal weather patterns
-
Florida erases rainbow crosswalk at Pulse nightclub
Speed Read The colorful crosswalk was outside the former LGBTQ nightclub where 49 people were killed in a 2016 shooting
-
Trump says Smithsonian too focused on slavery's ills
Speed Read The president would prefer the museum to highlight 'success,' 'brightness' and 'the future'
-
Trump to host Kennedy Honors for Kiss, Stallone
Speed Read Actor Sylvester Stallone and the glam-rock band Kiss were among those named as this year's inductees
-
White House seeks to bend Smithsonian to Trump's view
Speed Read The Smithsonian Institution's 21 museums are under review to ensure their content aligns with the president's interpretation of American history
-
Charlamagne Tha God irks Trump with Epstein talk
Speed Read The radio host said the Jeffrey Epstein scandal could help 'traditional conservatives' take back the Republican Party
-
CBS cancels Colbert's 'Late Show'
Speed Read 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert' is ending next year
-
A long weekend in Zürich
The Week Recommends The vibrant Swiss city is far more than just a banking hub
-
Shakespeare not an absent spouse, study proposes
speed read A letter fragment suggests that the Shakespeares lived together all along, says scholar Matthew Steggle