Jon Stewart has addressed the numerous rumours surrounding Donald Trump’s health as the comedian returned from his summer break.
The 62-year-old began this week’s edition of The Daily Show by saying that August is traditionally a quiet month for political news, but that wasn’t the case this year.
Listing off developments such as Trump’s meeting with Vladimir Putin, the Epstein files and Taylor Swift getting engaged, Stewart said that it had been a blur.
He added that this all took a backseat to rumours surrounding Trump’s health, noting that the president had been “absent from the public eye” and that “the “hashtag ‘Trump is dead’ trended on social media”.
After showing news clips of reporters discussing Trump’s health, Stewart jokingly said that journalists have “no chill”.
“Guy can’t take a few days for some R&R and a non-surgical breast reduction without everybody suddenly pulling out the toe tags?” he added. “It does say something about the ubiquity of Donald Trump in our lives that we don’t hear from him for 20 minutes and we’re like, ‘He’s dead!’”
Stewart reassured his viewers that Trump is alive but did point out that the president was diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency early this year, a condition where a person’s leg veins don’t allow blood to flow back up to the heart.
While discussing Trump’s “unsightly cankles” and “lumpy eyes”, Stewart said: “See, this is the problem with our superficial Instagram culture. We have unrealistic expectations in this country about the amount of fluid we should be able to clear subcutaneously.”
Trump recently clapped back at speculation about his health, claiming that he has “NEVER FELT BETTER IN MY LIFE” during a Truth Social rant.
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Given the president’s condition, Stewart suggested that many of the president’s closest allies appear to be saying their goodbyes to Trump.
“Once you begin to notice this pattern, you begin to see really the whole vibe around this president is very Make-A-Wish kid,” he said. “Everyone who shows up to his office and tries to make one of his dreams come true.”
The Make-A-Wish Foundation is a US charity formed in 1980 that helps fulfil the wishes and dreams of seriously ill children. Actor and wrestler John Cena holds the record for granting more than 650 wishes.
Stewart provided further examples of Trump’s Make-a-Wish kid behaviour, such as receiving an honorary United States Marshal Service badge, demanding to win the Nobel Peace Prize, being allowed to touch the FIFA World Cup trophy and allowing the Supreme Court’s federal agents to target people for deportation based on race or language.
“I’m beginning to think Trump isn’t a benign suffering child at all,” Stewart said. “I’m beginning to think everybody treats Trump like this, not because he’s the Make-A-Wish kid, but because he’s that Twilight Zone kid that anytime somebody made him mad, he sent them out to the cornfield.”
“For your consideration, a nation held hostage by the fragile ego of a man-baby president, who may or may not be dying of hand syphilis, but is puffy – I don’t know if he’s dying, [but] he’s weirdly puffy – and who we’re trapped with for at least three more years, in the Twilight Zone.”
