Since Katie Britt’s instant classic horror show of a State of the Union rebuttal on Thursday, everyone’s taken their turn dragging it. Colin Jost not only torched it on SNL‘s Weekend Update, he even coaxed his Oscar-nominated actress wife to play her in the Cold Open. By the time Jon Stewart’s weekly Monday stint on The Daily Show rolled around, he had to find a new angle of attack. And indeed he did.
In his latest opening monologue, Stewart singled out a moment that had been talked about but not in a certain way. It was when Britt hammily claimed that the Republican party, specifically the one consumed by MAGA, was “steeped in the blood of patriots,” namely the Founding Fathers.
After making light of Britt saying “steeped in the blood of patriots” while smiling, Stewart got to the heart of the matter. “This is just one more entry in the Republican mythology that they are the inheritors of the American Revolutionary tradition — that they somehow are more American-y than non-Republican Americans,” he said.
Republicans may tout that they are the “party of the Constitution,” complete with buses draped in the document. But, Stewart argued, that’s not terribly convincing when they’ve turned the party over to Donald Trump. He then laid out some ways he’s not so Constitution-y:
- He’s the guy who thinks the president should be above the law.
- He’s the guy who wants to shred the First Amendment for journalists, threatening jail time — where, Trump threatened, they’d become “the bride of another prisoner” — if they don’t reveal leakers.
- He’s the guy who wants to shoot protesters protesting, thus ignoring the right to assembly.
- He’s the guy who want to shoot looters on-site, thus ignoring due process.
- He’s the guy who has straight-up said he’d be a “dictator” on day one.
“Look, if you want to love Trump, love him,” Stewat said. “You want to give him absolute power? You want to make him leader uber alles? You want him to have the right of kings? You do you. But stop framing it as patriotism. Because the one thing you cannot say is that Donald Trump is following the tradition of the Founders. He is advocating for complete and total presidential immunity — his words, not mine. That is monarchy sh*t.”
You can watch Stewart’s latest Daily Show opener in the video above.