A day after President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race, the host behind “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” spent part of his Monday night episode’s opening monologue recounting Biden’s accomplishments in office.
“I believe he has been a great president,” Colbert told his audience. “He steered this country out of a horrific pandemic. He saved countless lives by encouraging people to get vaccinated. He brought the economy back. He rallied our allies, he reasserted America’s place in the world stage, and most inspiring of all, at no time was he Donald Trump. Inspiring.”
Colbert said he was going to miss Biden — and noted that “on this very program right over there on September 10, 2015, I encouraged then-Vice President Biden to run. He ignored me for five years, and then he did it!”
Colbert then announced that he has retired his pair of Biden-style aviator sunglasses, which will now reside on his set’s backdrop, “in a place of honor next to Captain America’s shield.”
The host added, “Those aviators did the hardest job of all. They made it seem like I had a Joe Biden impression.”
Colbert noted that he doesn’t have an impression for Vice President Kamala Harris — who will now serve as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. So instead, he donned a new pair of aviators. “‘Hey everybody, I’m Kamala Harris,’” he said in impression that was, tongue-in-cheek, still more Biden-esque. “‘I’m gonna be you’re new president, Jack!’ We’re still working on it.”
Those aviators weren’t the only thing that Colbert joked that he would end.
“I am officially retiring all of my ‘Joe Biden is old’ jokes,” he said. “They were starting to get tired anyway. Just like Joe Biden. That was the last one, I swear! Now, I’m going to un-retire them and to use on Donald Trump.” With that, he took a binder labeled “Joe Biden Old,” and flipped it to read, “Donald Trump Old.”
Colbert’s Monday night episode (11:35 p.m. ET on CBS) also includes guest Keanu Reeves, who joins Colbert on the ground in the “Big Questions with Even Bigger Stars” segment. And musician Charles Wesley Godwin additionally performs on the episode.
Oh, and Colbert is getting into the Charli XCX of it all, just as Harris’ campaign also embraces being a part of Charli XCX’s ‘Brat’ summer:
Watch this part of Colbert’s monologue here, courtesy CBS/The Late Show:
