Late night hosts cheer Team USA's Olympics medal win, lose their invites to Obama's birthday bash

"The 2020 Tokyo Olympics ended yesterday, and U.S. athletes brought home 39 gold medals, 41 silvers, 33 bronze, and 4 new variants," Seth Meyers joked on Monday's Late Night. "President Biden on Saturday held a Zoom call with Team USA Olympians, and if you thought winning a gold medal was tough, try explaining to a 78-year-old man that he's muted."
"The Tokyo Olympics have officially come to an end," so "now if you want to witness physical excellence, you'll have to watch a flight attendant duct-tape a drunk guy to his seat," Jimmy Fallon said at The Tonight Show. "After an incredible last day, Team USA topped the final medal count with 113 medals," and "meanwhile, all the country wants to talk about is how often celebrities bathe." (You can watch Stephen Colbert explain that punchline.) The White House announced Friday that 50 percent of all Americans are fully vaccinated, he added. "Is it just me, or does this feel like a group project where half the team does all the work?"
The news "is a little rough — there's a fourth wave of coronavirus, we just got a global warming red alert for humanity, there are wildfires consuming Northern California and Greece — so naturally there's one question on everyone's mind: Did I go to Barack Obama's birthday party?" Colbert said on The Late Show. Despite multiple news reports, he explained, his invitation was downsized due to the contagious COVID-19 Delta variant. "Kids, if you work hard, put in your time, and get to be the No. 1 show in late-night television, you too can get disinvited from the cool kids' party," Colbert said.
Subscribe to 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.
But the highly infectious Delta variant didn't just spoil his chance to party with Obama's circle, Colbert said. "As with all bad news, there's bad and then there's Florida," which "has broken its own record for new coronavirus cases."
The dire U.N. report on the irreversible damage humanity has done to the Earth and its climate made eco-heroes drink to forget in The Late Show's cold open.
And David Spade brought the climate report and the Olympics together in one quip on Jimmy Kimmel Live. "I hope you enjoyed [the Tokyo Games], because with global warming, even the Winter Olympics will soon be the Summer Olympics," he said. Then he archly recapped this season of The Bachelorette, and you can watch that below.
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.
-
5 museum-grade cartoons about Trump's Smithsonian purge
Cartoons Artists take on institutional rebranding, exhibit interpretation, and more
-
Settling the West Bank: a death knell for a Palestine state?
In the Spotlight The reality on the ground is that the annexation of the West Bank is all but a done deal
-
Codeword: August 23, 2025
The Week's daily codeword puzzle
-
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
-
Shakespeare not an absent spouse, study proposes
speed read A letter fragment suggests that the Shakespeares lived together all along, says scholar Matthew Steggle
-
New Mexico to investigate death of Gene Hackman, wife
speed read The Oscar-winning actor and his wife Betsy Arakawa were found dead in their home with no signs of foul play