Kimmel’s 2-Word Text After Melania Came for Him

When Melania Trump went on social media to blast Jimmy Kimmel for a joke about her, Kimmel did what any reasonable person would do: he texted the group chat. And according to John Oliver, those first two words said everything.

“It’s an amazing thing to get a text from Jimmy saying ‘Oh, boy,’ and then a picture of Melania mad at him,” Oliver told the audience during Monday’s special episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. “What a way to start the day!”

The episode brought together five of late-night’s biggest names — Colbert, Kimmel, Oliver, Jimmy Fallon, and Seth Meyers — for a rare joint appearance as Colbert counts down to his final broadcast on May 21. It was a reunion of the Strike Force Five podcast crew, and the conversation quickly turned to the controversy that had dogged Kimmel for weeks.

The Joke That Started It All

On April 23, Kimmel taped what he called an “alternative” White House Correspondents’ Dinner segment for Jimmy Kimmel Live! — a parody roast that included a pointed line about the first lady. “Our first lady, Melania, is here. Look at Melania, so beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow,” Kimmel said during the bit.

The timing became deeply complicated when, two days later, a gunman was stopped attempting to enter the Washington, D.C. Hilton where the actual WHCA dinner was being held, with what authorities described as apparent designs on killing the president and members of his Cabinet. Melania seized on the moment, posting on April 27 that Kimmel’s joke amounted to “hateful and violent rhetoric” that was “intended to divide our country” and calling on ABC to “take a stand” against him.

Donald Trump went further on Truth Social: “This is something far beyond the pale. Jimmy Kimmel should be immediately fired by Disney and ABC.” And then, separately: “When is ABC Fake News Network firing seriously unfunny Jimmy Kimmel, who incompetently presides over one of the Lowest Rated shows on Television. People are angry. It better be soon!!!”

Melania also called Kimmel a “coward,” saying “people like Kimmel shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate.”

Kimmel addressed it directly in his April 27 monologue, describing the comment as “obviously a joke about their age difference and the look of joy we see on her face every time they’re together.” He was more blunt in a follow-up: “It was a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80 and she’s younger than I am. It was not by any stretch a call to assassination.”

The Group Chat Reaction

Back on Monday’s Late Show, Colbert asked the group whether they had ever imagined they’d be doing jobs the president of the United States had “strong feelings” about.

“You know what’s even weirder?” Kimmel said. “Doing a job that his wife has strong feelings about.”

“Most of us have avoided that part,” Meyers deadpanned.

That’s when Oliver dropped the detail about the group text — the “Oh, boy” message paired with a screenshot of Melania’s post. And then Fallon, never one to miss a moment, cheerfully threw Kimmel under the bus.

“And then I sent a text to you guys, and I said, ‘Hey, don’t be mad at me, but I liked it,’” Fallon said. “I think she’s got a point.”

When Colbert pressed Kimmel on how it feels to wake up and see that kind of attention rolling in, the answer was more self-deprecating than you might expect from someone at the center of a White House firestorm.

“The saddest part of it is that I realize in those moments that the only four people who care are sitting right here,” Kimmel said. “It takes 12 hours for the rest of the people in my life to even figure out that anything’s going on.” He paused, then added the kicker: “Two hours after that, a guy I used to work with sent me a text. He’s like, ‘Hey, do you know a real estate lawyer?’”

A Farewell With a Few Scores to Settle

The Melania drama wasn’t the only thing on the table. The episode had a charged undercurrent throughout, because everyone in that room knows what’s coming: Colbert’s last show airs May 21, after CBS announced it was ending The Late Show for what the network called financial reasons.

Colbert has been measured but pointed about the decision, particularly given that it came after Paramount Global — CBS’s parent company — settled a lawsuit brought by Trump over a 60 Minutes interview for $16 million. “The network had clearly already done it once by cutting that $16 million check,” Colbert told The Hollywood Reporter. “There are many people who believe there was another reason. And, as I said in the most measured tones I could muster, there is a reason why people believe that.”

Kimmel wasn’t quite as measured. He called out CBS and Paramount+ directly, asking the audience, “Why aren’t you people canceling Paramount+? Because you didn’t have it in the first place?” And when Colbert asked if there was anything left to say, Kimmel didn’t hold back: “The outrage that your show is being thrown off the air? I am waiting for angry Stephen to come out. I want to see you go nuts.”

The audience chanted Colbert’s name. Oliver joked, “That’s exactly what they shouted at Bruce Banner in the lab before things went south.” Kimmel, for his part, kept it going: “When this guy takes off his glasses and shakes out his hair, it’s the sexiest god—- thing that you’ve ever seen.”

Kimmel also announced he won’t air a new episode on the night of Colbert’s finale — the same gesture he made when David Letterman signed off years ago.

When someone brought up the likelihood that Colbert’s cancellation might eventually shrink the group, Kimmel found the line of the night: “Don’t worry, give me a few months and it’ll be Strike Force Three.”