Late-night hosts on Thursday discussed the cancellation of Donald Trump’s planned summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, which was scheduled to take place in Singapore on 12 June.
Stephen Colbert
“The world continues to wait with baited breath and fully stocked bomb shelters to see if Donald Trump will have that summit with North Korean dictator and bored mozzarella ball, Kim Jong-un,” Stephen Colbert began. “Trump is hoping he can convince Kim to end his country’s nuclear program. If Trump is successful, it’ll be a monumental achievement; just ask him.”
The host then showed footage of a reporter asking Trump if he thinks he deserves the Nobel peace prize. The president responded: “Everyone thinks so, but I would never say it.”
“Now, it looks like Un is unlikely to attend,” Colbert explained. “Last week, he abruptly canceled talks with the South because it was holding joint military exercises with the US, which North Korea called a ‘provocation’ and a rehearsal for an invasion.”
The host then mentioned John Bolton, who he called a “muppet on trial at the Hague”, and how the national security adviser’s comments about North Korea having to agree to a disarmament deal similar to the one Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi agreed to in 2003 threw a wrench in talks with the US.
Colbert added: “Well, that turned out OK for Gaddafi, right? Should we ask him?”
On Wednesday, Colbert continued, “Trump reassured a troubled world that the summit will occur, maybe, who knows,” showing footage of Trump saying “someday a date will happen”.
“They’ve got no choice now because they’ve already made the commemorative coin marking the occasion of the summit,” the host joked. “It’s got Trump and Un, and I have to commend the designers, they were truly committed to jowl accuracy.”
Jimmy Kimmel
ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel also discussed the summit and Trump’s diplomatic skills.
“Only Donald Trump could cancel a summit with Kim Jong-un in the morning and then have a meeting with Sylvester Stallone later in the day,” Kimmel said. “Soak it up: we’ll probably never see anything like this again.
“The president cancelled his June 12 meeting with Kim Jong-un today after North Korea’s vice-minister of foreign affairs called Mike Pence a dummy, which did not sit well with one Donald Janice Trump,” the host continued. “It was the nuclear non-proliferation equivalent of ‘you break up with me, I break up with you.’”
Referring to the letter Trump sent Kim Jong-un on Thursday, which formally announced the cancellation of the summit, Kimmel said: “This is some letter, by the way. Not exactly what you would call Lincolnesque.”
“This to me is the most interesting part of the letter,” the host said, before reading an excerpt: “You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.”
In another excerpt, Trump says, “I felt a wonderful dialogue was building up between you and me.”
“South Korea, who really has the most to lose in all of this, was reportedly caught totally off-guard,” Kimmel noted, reading aloud a statement released by a South Korean spokesperson. “They wrote: We are trying to figure out what president Trump’s intention is and what its exact meaning is.”
“Well, welcoming to the club,” Kimmel replied, “because we are, too, every day.”
Seth Meyers
Finally, NBC’s Seth Meyers also weighed in on the subject of US-North Korean relations.
“President Trump has spent weeks hyping his upcoming summit with North Korea,” Meyers began. “He’s earned glowing praise from the media, chants of Nobel from his crowds, and his government even made a commemorative coin to mark the occasion.”
Meyers, who bought a commemorative coin for himself, showed it to the audience before cutting to news coverage about how the talks have stalled.
“It’s my fault,” he said. “I should’ve learned my lesson after I bought commemorative coins for the completed border wall, biggest inauguration ever, Anthony Scaramucci’s first 100 days on the job, ‘cleared of all charges’ and People’s Sexist Man Alive.
“Trump canceled the summit, which shouldn’t surprise anyone,” Meyers said. “He repeatedly made clear he had no idea what he was doing.”
As an example, Meyers said that Trump, who wrote in his letter that North Korea should follow the path of denuclearization, was vague when asked how such a process would work. Asked by a reporter how denuclearization would take place, the president said: “I have a strong idea how it takes place, it must take place. I have very strong opinions on the subject.”
“Once again,” Meyers concluded, “Donald Trump is a teenager who didn’t prepare his oral report and is now stalling for the bell to ring.”
