Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, and Trevor Noah are bemused at the partisan fury over infrastructure
Tuesday's Late Show opened with jokes about Heinz's new Martian ketchup.
"Heinz today revealed what they are billing as their first-ever Mars-edition ketchup," or "ketchup made from tomatoes that were produced under the same conditions they have on Mars," Jimmy Kimmel said on Kimmel Live. "I don't know why, either. I hope they didn't grow them the same way Matt Damon grew his poop potatoes."
Former President Donald Trump is losing his court battle to shield his Jan. 6 files from the House committee investigating the riot, Kimmel said, and "if these documents are made public we may finally know whether Trump and his associates were as involved in the events of Jan. 6 as we already know they were." He also ran through the conviction of prominent Jan. 6 participant Jenna Ryan.
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Things aren't great for President Biden, either, Kimmel noted. "According to the latest poll from USA Today, Biden's approval rating clocks in at 38 percent. That was before Congress passed the infrastructure bill, though, and if anything can get the American people fired up, it's infrastructure."
According to one survey, "the majority of Americans say Biden isn't paying attention to the nation's most important issues," Stephen Colbert said on The Late Show. "Yes, he's focused on things Americans don't care about, like infrastructure. He needs to change his slogan from Build Back Better to We Have the Meats."
Meanwhile, "in Congress they're still focused on who tried to kill everyone in Congress," Colbert said, running through the latest Jan. 6 committee subpoenas.
"After months of fighting between liberal and moderate Democrats, the House finally passed America's biggest infrastructure bill in decades," Trevor Noah said on The Daily Show. "It's going to do things like repair America's crumbling bridges, fix America's crumbling roads, and vacuum up the mess from America's crumbling Nature Valley granola bars." And Trump and his congressional allies immediately hammered the 13 House Republicans who voted for the bill.
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"What's amazing to me about this situation is that this partisan anger, it's happening over an infrastructure bill!" Noah said. "Infrastructure! I mean, I would get it if the new roads they were building all led to an abortion clinic, or they were adding special carpool lanes that were just for nonbinary people, but it's just fixing things for everybody." He finished with some skepticism about Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) blaming "left wing" videogames and porn for killing masculinity.
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.
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