Jon Stewart roasts Trump over blunt Venezuela oil remarks: ‘Is this your first war?’
WASHINGTON, DC: Jon Stewart ripped into Donald Trump on Monday night, January 5, tearing up his own papers as he reacted to what he called the president’s painfully obvious excuses for the US military’s capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro.
Recapping the operation on 'The Daily Show,' Stewart joked that the illegitimate Venezuelan leader had been “reverse ICE’d,” explaining, “He was actually imported to a jail in Brooklyn."
While Stewart acknowledged the controversial ethics of military action, he suggested that Americans might want to brace themselves for how history typically treats such moments.
“Based on the United States’ track record, my guess is we’re going to be really happy about this for a couple of weeks, and then 30 years from now, there will be a Venezuelan leftist revolution and the new government will point to this moment as the reason our embassy there is on fire,” Stewart said. “And it will absolutely ruin a Democrat’s presidency. Generally, that’s how this s**t works.”
Jon Stewart mocks Trump’s oil justification for Venezuela action
Trump has pointed to Venezuela’s oil reserves as part of the rationale for the intervention. “We’re going to get the oil flowing the way it should be,” he told reporters.
That explanation did not sit well with Stewart. “Seems a little… on the nose,” he observed. “Um. Oil, [a] precious commodity, certainly, but not the reason a country, formed 250 years ago on the ideas of liberty and self-determination, would go into a country and snatch a man at night? There must be a slightly more noble pretense.”
'The Daily Show' then rolled clips of Trump continuing to openly reference Venezuela’s oil, and Stewart’s disbelief only grew. “Is this your first war?!” he asked.
Hoping someone with more experience could help clean up the messaging, Stewart turned to South Carolina Sen Lindsey Graham and called him an “old hand at war-mongering.”
“You’ve done this a bunch,” Stewart pleaded. “Can you help this dude out with a casus belli and keep Trump from bringing it back to oil?”
The show then played a clip of Graham attempting to do just that, only for Trump to interrupt and boast about the opportunity Maduro’s removal created for oil companies. “Godd**n it! What?!?” Stewart shouted, tearing his papers in half. “We can’t even be conspiracy theorists now! ‘I think they did it for the oil.’ ‘Yeah, no, I did it for the oil.’”
Jon Stewart slams Trump’s 'conquistador' foreign policy rhetoric
Stewart did not hold back as the segment continued. “These motherf**kers are going full conquistador in front of our eyes!” he said.
After clips aired of Trump expressing interest in other foreign countries and territories, including Greenland and Colombia, Stewart summed up what he sees as America’s current approach to global affairs.
“Let the word go forth to a new generation of Americans that if we need s**t and it’s not too far away, we are going to take it,” Stewart declared.
He closed by addressing Trump directly. “Anything else you want to take over?” Stewart asked. “I think there’s still some time to go after Warner Bros Discovery! I mean, America doesn’t have Netflix money, but we will after we get that sweet oil,” he quipped.
