It’s been a rough time in court for former President Donald Trump. Not only was he fined $9,000 and threatened with jail time for violating a gag order, but on Tuesday he was forced to listen–quietly–as porn star Stormy Daniels gave a long, in-depth testimony about her experience with him during their alleged 2006 affair.
Daniels’ testimony was apparently considered so graphic that the judge criticized it for going into “too much detail,” but Seth Meyers, Stephen Colbert, and Jordan Klepper didn’t seem to mind, all throwing in plenty of jokes at Trump’s expense during their opening monologues Tuesday night.
But none of them seemed to be having quite as much fun as Jimmy Kimmel.
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Kimmel started off his show by marveling at how he himself was once again mentioned in the trial. He explained how Daniels was asked to recount her 2018 interview with Kimmel, where they talked about the scandal. “Somehow, I’ve become the Kato Kaelin of this trial,” Kimmel said, referring to one of the most dramatic witnesses in the O.J. Simpson trial.
Kimmel then described how the judge told Daniels’ team that they didn’t need to hear the graphic details of her affair, to which he responded, “See, now that’s where I have to object. Yes, we do need to know the details. Some of us are trying to host a show here!”
Kimmel quipped that Daniels’ testimony, where she recalled Trump not wearing a condom during their alleged sexual encounter, was “not surprising” and joked about Daniels’ claim that Trump would refer to her as “honey bunch” during the affair. “Interestingly, it’s also a term Melania would use at Mar-a-Lago. As in, ‘Honey, bunch of FBI agents out there!’”
For anyone in the audience who may for some reason be disappointed that Daniels didn’t share any details on Trump’s genitalia, Kimmel jokingly comforted them with the advice that they could always “go to our YouTube channel and type in, ‘Trump Mushroom Penis Stormy Daniels.’ It has 18 million views, you’ll love it.”
Kimmel also focused on how, after having sex, Trump told Daniels that she reminded him of his daughter, Ivanka. “Feels like we should lock him up just for that,” he remarked, to big laughs and applause.
Kimmel then read to his audience Daniels’ account of how she “came out of the bathroom and found that Trump was in the bedroom waiting for her, in his boxer shorts and a T-shirt… he was seated on the bed between her and the exit.” Kimmel mocked the image of him doing this, reminding viewers of that infamous viral photo of a younger Trump lying flirtatiously in a bathroom robe. “Just feast your eyes on this and you’ll see that no one puts the mold and smoldering on like Donald Trump,” he said.
Kimmel finished off by mocking Trump’s Truth Social post during the court’s lunch break to argue for a mistrial. “Trump's lawyers argued that Stormy’s testimony was prejudicial,” he joked, “Because how is the jury supposed to be fair now that they visualized him in the missionary position? How are any of us supposed to move forward with that image?”
