The day after the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Late Show host Stephen Colbert told his studio audience that we had “four very interesting years in front of us.”
“I might have undersold that just a smidge,” Colbert said to his pandemic-empty studio on Tuesday. “It has been interesting — in the same way that riding in a car going over a cliff is thought provoking.”
There are less than 24 hours before President-elect Joe Biden will finally be sworn into office, ending President-eject Donald Trump’s term as well as the Late Show‘s literal countdown to said end. Looking back over the past four years, Colbert recalled some memorable moments we might have forgotten in the overwhelming deluge of memorable moments from the outgoing commander in chief.
“Some of the highlights of his lowlights include starting his presidency by decrying ‘American carnage,’ his Muslim travel ban, ‘very fine people on both sides,’ bonding with Putin in Helsinki, bonding with Kim Jong-un in Singapore, bonding with the My Pillow guy everywhere else, wanting to trade Puerto Rico for Greenland, talking about nuking hurricanes or changing their path with a Sharpie, calling the 26 women who accused him of sexual assault ‘liars,’ wishing an accused sex trafficker well, caging asylum seeking children that he tore from their parents, getting impeached for trying to blackmail Ukraine to interfere in our election, completely shanking a pandemic, teargassing peaceful protesters, holding a Bible dumb, undermining faith in our democracy, inciting an angry mob to murder his own vice president, and ruining ‘Y.M.C.A,’” Colbert rattled off.
It has been a tough few years, to say the least. However Colbert also noted that, despite it all, there were still some victories to be had.
“Throughout all of the craziness and threats to everything we hold sacred, there was one hero who kept our country together,” said Colbert. “And that’s you. The American people. For all of his dangerous assaults on democracy, democracy kicked his ass all the way back to Florida. And in this case, I for one will never be sick of winning.”