Trump Warns That Colbert's Finale Episode Is the 'Beginning of the End' for Late-Night Hosts: 'May They All Rest in Peace!'

Joseph KonigFri, May 22, 2026 at 4:42 PM UTC

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President Donald Trump on April 30. Stephen Colbert on April 27. Jimmy Kimmel on Dec. 15, 2025.
Credit: Samir Hussein - Pool/Getty; Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty for FLC; Randy Holmes/Disney via Getty -

The morning after Stephen Colbert’s Late Show finale, President Donald Trump shared a message for other late-night television hosts whom he frequently clashes with: “May they all Rest in Peace!”

The threat that Colbert’s counterparts at other networks will “soon follow” him into cancellation came on Friday, May 22, just hours after Trump posted his 2 a.m. farewell to Colbert

Trump has twice tried to get ABC to fire Jimmy Kimmel, to no avail

The morning after Stephen Colbert’s Late Show finale, President Donald Trump shared a message for the late-night television hosts whom he frequently clashes with: “May they all Rest in Peace!”

Late-night comedy is currently dominated by The Tonight Show's Jimmy Fallon on NBC, Jimmy Kimmel Live!'s Jimmy Kimmel on ABC, Late Night's Seth Meyers on NBC, The Daily Show's Jon Stewart on Comedy Central and Last Week Tonight's John Oliver on HBO.

Trump's threat that Colbert’s counterparts at other networks will “soon follow” him into cancellation came on Friday, May 22, just hours after the president posted his 2 a.m. ET farewell to Colbert, in which he called the outgoing CBS host a “total jerk” who performed “like a dead person.”

“Stephen Colbert’s firing from CBS was the ‘Beginning of the End’ for untalented, nasty, highly overpaid, not funny, and very poorly rated Late Night Television Hosts,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday morning. “Others, of even less talent, to soon follow. May they all Rest in Peace! President DONALD J. TRUMP.”

PEOPLE sought comment from The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Late Night with Seth Meyers, The Daily Show and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver about Trump's apparent warning.

Colbert’s show was canceled in July 2025, just days after he mocked CBS' parent company, Paramount, for agreeing to a $16 million settlement with Trump, who had sued the network over its editing of a 2024 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris.

CBS has maintained that the Late Show's cancellation was entirely a financial decision, but it came as Paramount was pursuing a controversial merger with Skydance Media, led by Trump ally and billionaire David Ellison.

Stephen Colbert waves goodbye during his May 21 finale of 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.'
Credit: Scott Kowalchyk/CBS via Getty

During Colbert’s final show on Thursday, May 21, he took a swipe at CBS’ money gripes by having his band play music from the iconic Peanuts cartoons, like A Charlie Brown Christmas, in hopes of getting the network sued by the music’s litigious rights owner.

"Oh no, I hope this doesn't cost CBS any money," Colbert joked.

The finale also featured friends and stars like Paul McCartney and Bryan Cranston, as well as his fellow late-night show hosts from the so-called Strike Force Five: Fallon, Kimmel, Meyers and Oliver.

'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert' and guests Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, John Oliver and Seth Meyers during the May 11 show
Credit: Scott Kowalchyk/CBS via Getty

Trump apparently stayed up past the program, writing at 1:52 a.m.: “Colbert is finally finished at CBS. Amazing that he lasted so long!”

“No talent, no ratings, no life. He was like a dead person,” the president continued on Truth Social. “You could take any person off of the street and they would be better than this total jerk. Thank goodness he’s finally gone!”

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Colbert, 62, told PEOPLE in a recent interview that it was foolish for the president to care what TV comedians say about him.

“The ending of the show aside, which people can speculate about all they want, and I can’t argue with their speculations, but we’re clowns,” Colbert said. “How much does it diminish the office of the presidency to even notice what we say?"

The Late Show finale did not feature a single mention of Trump, according to CNN.

Stephen Colbert is seen at an after-party for the finale of "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" on May 21 in New York.
Credit: XNY/Star Max/GC Images

Trump has routinely paid attention to the jokes on late-night programs and has attacked hosts frequently with both his rhetoric and the weight of the federal government.

In September 2025, Trump urged Disney-owned ABC to fire Kimmel over comments he made after the killing of Charlie Kirk. After a brief suspension, Kimmel returned to the air and signed on for another year of his show.

Then, in the aftermath of the assassination attempt at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in April, first lady Melania Trump demanded ABC punish Kimmel for a joke he made about her the week prior, and the president subsequently called for Kimmel's firing.

The second time around, Kimmel faced no repercussions from his corporate bosses.

"Our first couple, Donald and Melania ... lately have seemed closer than ever," Kimmel joked at the time. "And I like to think I played a part in that."

Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr quickly announced a probe into Disney, nominally investigating the company’s diversity programs and ABC daytime stalwart The View for allegedly violating federal equal-time rules for broadcast networks.

Carr said at the time that “hopefully” broadcasters are scared of him and he would “be surprised if we ultimately don’t go down the path of license revocation for some” networks.

“These national programmers running out of New York and Hollywood are effectively using local TV stations as their own mouthpieces to push this New York and Hollywood foie gras all across the country,” Carr said in April. “And that's not how it's supposed to be.”

on People

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