The Daily Show host Jon Stewart couldn’t help but mock Elon Musk after the influential multi-billionaire and X owner spoke at a rally for Donald Trump on Saturday, going viral for his awkward, enthusiastic jumping as he entered the stage.
“Elon Musk has ups,” Stewart quipped in his monologue on Monday, before showing the clip of Musk jumping around. When it was over he was laughing along with the audience.
“He’s acting like a guy who won a radio contest. ‘Oh, I can’t believe I get to bid on the washer-dryer!’” Stewart said.
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He played the moment where Musk described himself as “not just MAGA,” but “dark MAGA.”
“I didn’t know it came in flavors,” Stewart joked. “I wonder if for the holidays, they’ll come out with a peppermint bark MAGA.”
On a more serious note, Stewart played part of Musk’s speech where he claimed that Democrats were the anti-free speech party.
Stewart, who had spent the earlier part of his monologue detailing Trump’s desire to sue the creators of the new movie The Apprentice, didn’t buy this argument at all.
“It’s not free speech if only Trump’s admirers get to do it without consequence,” Stewart said.
The Daily Show host was particularly frustrated with Musk’s joke about how, “The Second Amendment is there to ensure that we have the First Amendment.”
Stewart replied, “The guns don’t protect our free speech. Our free speech is protected by the consent of the governed laid out through the Constitution. It’s not based on the threat of violence.”
He continued, “Guns, from what I can tell, seem to mostly protect the speech of the people holding the gun. It’s a tool of intimidation. It is a tool of intimidation and one that I think is actually being irresponsibly and recklessly invoked because some people in your crowd thought they might have been shadowbanned by Facebook.”
“I mean, for God’s sakes, you guys are in Butler, Pennsylvania,” Stewart said. “The whole reason you’re there is because some f---ing asshole with an AR-15 tried to permanently litigate his vision of this country’s ‘free speech.’ That’s why you’re there.”
