Late-night hosts focused on the return of Hillary Clinton as they pulled apart sexism in politics and the entertainment industry.
On The Late Show, Stephen Colbert looked back at Clinton’s appearance at the Women for Women international conference, where she was interviewed by CNN host Christiane Amanpour, who asked her if she thought sexism exists in the states.
“Asking Hillary Clinton if sexism exists is like asking Serena Williams if she’s heard about this tennis thing,” Colbert joked.
When footage was shown of Clinton saying that “you couldn’t make this stuff up” while referring to the series of events that led to her defeat in the general election, Colbert said: “Actually, you can make up whatever you want. Have you met our current president? He’s like Stephen King.”
After Clinton said that she took full responsibility for the loss, Colbert said: “So she made mistakes, publicly recognised them and owned up to her shortcomings? No wonder she lost, that’s totally unpresidential.”
On The Daily Show, Trevor Noah also focused on Clinton’s conference appearance and said her time away from the public eye had been spent putting together acerbic putdowns aimed at Trump.
“She did so much dissing, all of the memes joined her on stage,” he said. “This is classic Hillary though. She goes away for six months, plans all of her comebacks and then goes on Christiane Amanpour and lets them all fly.”
Noah added that having Clinton back served as a reminder of what a competent politician should sound like.
“I will say this though, after 100 days of President Trump it was refreshing to hear a politician talk in full sentences about complicated issues,” he said. “When Hillary is speaking you can really tell that she knows who Frederick Douglass is.”
He went on to explain why he thinks Clinton failed to really reach the American people and convince them to elect her president.
“The fact is we’ve been inundated by cable news’ fake excitement and sound-bitingness for so long that I don’t think Hillary Clinton or a candidate like her could ever connect with people. Because say what you like about Donald Trump, but he doesn’t bore you.
“Listening to Hillary Clinton talk after getting used to Trump is like getting an iPhone after owning a Samsung. You know the iPhone won’t explode, but you miss the unpredictablility.”
Meanwhile, Seth Meyers joked about Ivanka Trump’s new book and how it benefits from her father’s brand, and about her father’s failure to understand that Andrew Jackson died 16 years before the civil war.
“Now that Trump learned when Andrew Jackson died, how often do you think he’s going to squeeze it into conversation?” he asked. “‘I was so sorry to hear about your mother, it’s just like when Andrew Jackson died 16 years before the civil war started. Not a lot of people know that. My condolences.’”
