Late-night TV roundup

Jimmy Kimmel on face mask fights: 'This is the dumbest standoff ever'

With most late-night hosts on vacation, Kimmel examines Trump golfing on the job, and the political statement that is not wearing a mask

Jimmy Kimmel

With Stephen Colbert, Trevor Noah, Seth Meyers and Jimmy Fallon on vacation this week, Jimmy Kimmel returned to air following a “weird Memorial Day” in shutdown. Still, despite physical distancing orders even in semi-reopened states, Donald Trump issued an executive order this weekend to open churches, mosques, and other places of worship “in an effort to make sure that the most devout Americans get a chance to contract the coronavirus too”, said Kimmel. 

The order was a “controversial decision, one that could endanger the lives of many,” Kimmel continued, “but anyone who knows Donald Trump knows he’s a man of great faith.”

As in, he spent Sunday on the golf course.

“It looks bad for the president to be golfing with 100,000 Americans dead and a stay-at-home order in place,” said Kimmel, “but try explaining optics to a guy who stared directly into an eclipse.”

Trump’s “brazen hypocrisy” gets even richer considering he once called into Fox & Friends during Obama’s presidency to complain Obama was slacking on his duties by golfing on occasional weekends. Kimmel contrasted the clip with how Fox & Friends twisted Trump’s outing: an example of him “leading the way” by getting back to normal during a pandemic.

“Oh, so he’s a hero? He’s not ‘golfing,’ he’s ‘leading the way,’” Kimmel deadpanned. “Do they know it’s not safe to have your nose so far up the president’s ass right now? There’s a virus going around.”

“These people have no shame, and no YouTube either,” he continued. “Trump spent what is supposed to be a weekend of gratitude and remembrance – Memorial Day – golfing, tweeting nutjob conspiracy theories and mocking Joe Biden for wearing a mask to a Memorial Day event.”

The mask bit is especially troubling, Kimmel continued, because it’s a federal and CDC health guideline that has now become a political statement – whether or not you wear it shows which side you’re on. Kimmel cycled through clips of crowded pool parties and beaches over the weekend in the Ozarks and Alabama, in which no one wore a mask; one young man told a local reporter he chose not to because the president doesn’t wear one. Another clip: shoppers at a grocery store in Staten Island hounded a mask-less woman out of the store with ample swearing.

“Of all the fights we’ve had over the last few years, this one makes the least sense,” Kimmel concluded on the mask fights. “This is the dumbest standoff ever. We all want to go back to work, we all want to go back to eat, we all want to hang out, none of us want to see people die. So if wearing a mask can help slow the virus and get us back to normal sooner, why not wear a mask?”

Kimmel decided if you’re not wearing a mask, you shouldn’t wear sunscreen either. “That should be the rule – if you don’t care about my wellbeing, you’re not allowed to care about your own. It’s very frustrating, and potentially tragic, and a real leader would straighten his sheep out.”