The weekend violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, prompted late night comics to strike a serious tone at the top of their shows Monday night.
Instead of a traditional joke-filled monologue, Jimmy Fallon opened his show with an emotional condemnation of the attack that left a woman dead and President Donald Trump’s failure to immediately denounce the white supremacist groups that organized the rally. Fallon says his “Tonight Show” isn’t political, but it’s his “responsibility to stand up against intolerance and extremism as a human being.”
Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel also took aim at Trump’s delayed condemnation, noting his eagerness to publicly criticize less important issues.
Seth Meyers spoke directly to the president with his opening comment , saying, “You can stand for a nation or you can stand for a hateful movement. You can’t do both.”