Ridiculing Donald Trump for insisting that children need to settle for fewer dolls and pencils in the midst of his global trade war, late-night host Jon Stewart noted that “if a Democrat even hinted at toy rationing,” there would be Fox News special coverage “on the sobbing children of socialist America.”
Kicking off Monday night’s Daily Show monologue with Trump’s interview with NBC News’ Kristen Welker, Stewart sarcastically wondered how the president would thread the “rhetorical needle” of “taking credit for the remaining good parts of the economy, while subtly assigning blame to Joe Biden for some of the bad, on fire parts.”
Airing a clip of the president flatly saying that “the good parts are the Trump economy and the bad parts are the Biden economy,” the late-night host quipped that Trump “nailed it” and made no attempt at nuance.
“Trump good, Biden bad. He’s a regular Shakespeare,” Stewart snarked.
“Look, I’m trying very hard in this new Trump flood-the-zone media ecosystem strategy to not get too high or low, to not take the bait, to find things in my life that give me pleasure or peace,” the comic continued. “For instance, quick story. I have a niece, 11 years old, loves dolls. I was gonna get her 20 to 30 of them for her birthday, just to see the joy of a child. You can’t put a price tag on that; it gives me great solace. Anyway, like I said, I’m not trying to take these interviews personally.”
Naturally, Stewart turned to the president telling Welker that he doesn’t “think a beautiful, baby girl that’s 11 years old needs to have 30 dolls” and children should just “have three dolls or four dolls” instead.
“It’s just not that many dolls,” Stewart jokingly exclaimed. “Sure, she can have a small tea party with her dolls. But her dream had been a quasi-realistic Conclave reenactment with dolls. That’s what she wanted!”
Still, Stewart held out hope for his figurative niece, observing that “dolls are not her only happy place anyway.” See, according to the Daily Show star, “she also loves taking standardized tests” and he was going to get her “this wonderful ‘Baby’s First SAT’ kit” that includes 250 pencils. “She is gonna love it,” he added.
“They don’t need to have 250 pencils. They can have five,” Trump then said in a clip from the Meet the Press interview. An over-the-top Stewart raged in response: “Motherf***er! How dare you?!”
Noting that “Trump has such a Depression-era view of what kids play with in 2025,” Stewart mockingly impersonated the president saying that “kids don’t need 20 sets of those hoops you hit down the street with a stick” because “just one hoop is Jim dandy!”
At the same time, the political satirist pointed out that conservative media would be losing their minds right now if a Democratic president had said anything similar to what Trump was spouting.
“If a Democrat had even hinted at toy rationing for American children, we’d have a full week of Fox Special Reports on the sobbing children of socialist America, and a boom in gun-toting patriots going, ‘You can have my G.I. Joe when you pry it from my kung-fu grip!’” Stewart declared.
In the end, the host said he “invented a chart” to help Americans “figure out which of the things it’s OK to get upset about and which things are just [Trump] f***ing off.” However, after airing a clip of the president announcing that he wants to reopen Alcatraz as a prison, Stewart lost it.
“What the f*** is that?!” Stewart yelled, adding: “I’m sorry. The chart was supposed to prevent this kind of over-emotional digression.”
After going through a few more crazy Trump moments, such as the president posting an AI image of himself as the pope, Stewart wondered if there was “anything during this chaotic news cycle that we should keep our eyes on” before turning back to the Welker interview.
Asked if he feels the need to “uphold the Constitution of the United States as president,” the president replied “I don’t know” to the NBC News anchor. “Holy sh*t. No, this is not OK,” Stewart reacted while expanding his chart.