This Week's News | Jon Stewart on Trump's Xi Summit & Jordan Klepper on Hegseth's Anti-Weirdo Crusade

The Daily Show: Ears Edition

The Daily News Team dissects President Trump's lavish welcome for Chinese President Xi Jinping, mocking the superficial White House tour while questioning whether MAGA loyalty is finally fracturing under conservative

Key takeaways

• Jon Stewart ridicules Trump's Xi Jinping summit as a shallow tour of unfinished White House renovations and granite features, contrasting it with China's advanced infrastructure like autonomous maglev trains.
• Klepper exposes the new government ad campaign as a recycled 2024 political spot disguised as official messaging, complete with bizarre artistic choices like an extended storage closet close-up.

Main topics

• Trump-Xi Summit & MAGA loyalty
• White House ad campaign controversy

Notable quotes

"We had a great meeting and he is great at fishing granite. He likes granite."

Conclusion

The episode uses sharp satire to highlight the contradictions and performative

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) You're listening to Comedy Central. Speaker 8 (0:08) Last week, a young man by the name of Donald Trump Speaker 8 (0:13) Picked up a young man by the name of Xi Jinping, Chinese president, at the airport for a pivotal three-day visit to Washington. Now, as with any monumental meeting of superpowers, with profound repercussions for global safety and stability, it began with Speaker 1 (0:32) House tour. Speaker 1 (0:36) Have you seen my pictures? Do you guys have pictures? Have you guys seen our outdoor carpet? Do you guys have outdoor carpet? Have you seen our sky? Do you have a sky? Oh, do you see that lady with the face? Yeah. Do you think she's pretty? Oh, good. Yeah, she's pretty. Speaker 1 (1:00) What a genuine thumbs up. Speaker 1 (1:03) It's the thumbs up you give when your friends show you their kid's artwork. Speaker 1 (1:11) Oh. Speaker 1 (1:15) Madison made that all out of macaroni. Speaker 1 (1:21) In fact, Trump spent most of Xi's White House visit just pointing at shit, while Xi did his best effort to pretend to be impressed. Although I'm sure they talked about issues of national importance. Speaker 5 (1:36) We had a great meeting and he is great at fishing granite. He likes granite. He's an expert on stone, aside from many other things. And he loves good granite. Speaker 1 (1:57) Does he? Speaker 1 (1:59) Does he love good granite? Speaker 1 (2:02) Is that his I love good granite face? Speaker 1 (2:08) Because it looks like his, I'd rather be standing in front of a tank in a square face. Speaker 1 (2:14) Yeah, look it up. Speaker 1 (2:18) Like, President Trump, I'm sure you're proud of your new circular granite helicopter parking spot, but just so you know, this is Shenzhen, China. Speaker 1 (2:31) They've got a fully autonomous magnetic levitation train. Pretty sure he's not blown away by carved rock in shape of circle. Speaker 1 (2:44) the way, you know, China did used to work in rock. How about 3,000 years ago? Speaker 1 (2:52) So again... I'm pretty sure Xi Jinping is not like, this used to be grass and now it's rock. Speaker 1 (3:05) We have so much to learn from your people. Speaker 1 (3:10) But listen. Yeah. Speaker 8 (3:15) I'm sure he wants to be a good host as long as Trump understands the seriousness of the competition between our two nations and is diligent in not undermining America's national security. I mean, national security is the whole reason we're paying $600 million for this ballroom, right? So you'll keep that behind the curtain, yeah? As Speaker 5 (3:34) a special treat in honor of President Xi and Madam Peng, I'd like to invite everyone in the room to visit through. that beautiful curtain in the back, the new ballroom that you've heard about. You'll be the first people to step foot Speaker 8 (3:50) on that. Maybe Trump's just trying to sell Xi Jinping on renting the ballroom out for his next big function. I don't know. Speaker 8 (4:00) Jewish. Surprising. Xi Jinping. Yeah. Who'd have thought? Probably changed his name. Anyway. Surprising how lighthearted their interactions seem to be given recent developments. Speaker 4 (4:13) China sent 1,300 shipments of drone and missile parts to Iran from the start of the year through the end of June. Speaker 8 (4:23) China has been sending weapons to Iran? Did China supplying Iran with weapons come up at all? The Speaker 3 (4:30) U.S. ambassador to China claims President Trump offered to sell American weapons to China. Speaker 8 (4:39) It only came up as an opportunity? I got to say, that sounds like bullshit. Unless I hear this from the actual mouth of the U.S. ambassador to China, I do not believe it. President Trump continues to say, hey, we sell Speaker 2 (4:54) arms to other people around the world. He actually asked President Xi would he like to buy some at one point. What the f***? Speaker 1 (5:05) America even stay on the map sometimes? I don't even, how do we not just slide into the sea? All right. I had to have misheard that. I got to hear it from the president himself. I won't believe it. Did Trump really offer to sell weapons to China? Is that accurate? Did you make Speaker 5 (5:19) such a suggestion? To China? To China. You mean to Taiwan? No, to China. That's what he said. I never heard of that one. I'm going to have to ask him. You mean we're going to sell? No, they probably like to buy it because we do make better equipment than them. So maybe it's a good idea. He totally f***ing offered them weapons. Speaker 8 (5:39) Oh, my God. You can almost see Trump trying to do the math in his head. Well, if Iran beats us with weapons that we make, it's kind of like we Speaker 1 (5:47) won the war. Speaker 1 (5:59) More question. Speaker 8 (5:59) I seem to remember the Republican Party used to frown on the idea of selling weapons to communist enemies who are supplying said weapons to other enemies we are currently at war with. Does anybody on that side have an opinion on this summit? Speaker 3 (6:11) President Trump with a lavish welcome for Chinese President Xi Jinping. Some Republicans now sounding the alarm. Speaker 4 (6:18) Getting some pushback from members of his own party. Not happy with the president's extravagant welcome. Speaker 3 (6:23) Frustrated that he's rolling out. The red carpet. Want Trump to drop the velvet glove and use the iron fist. A number of Republicans outraged with Trump's embrace of she. Oh, Speaker 1 (6:35) damn! Outraged! Speaker 1 (6:49) Republican Senator Roger Wicker, the great state of Mississippi, went down to the floor of the United States Senate to tell President Trump from his whole chest how he feels about this debacle. Quite frankly, had Speaker 4 (7:02) the White House asked me for advice, I would have suggested the president not invite Xi Jinping to Washington. Speaker 1 (7:11) Oh, shit! Speaker 1 (7:31) from someone who runs a small town southern funeral parlor. Speaker 1 (7:38) that he himself recently died in. Speaker 8 (7:44) But you know Trump. He's got nine lives. They're going to have to follow up that fiery rhetoric. Trump's a populist. He speaks the language of the people. He's not going to listen to the outrage unless it comes from someone like Senator John Kennedy, who's a simple Louisiana farm boy who Speaker 1 (8:00) was raised by a butter churn and two crawfish. Speaker 1 (8:05) Before, of course, attending Oxford Law. He knows what these dang Chinese are like. President Xi is one of the Speaker 4 (8:14) best liars I've ever seen. I mean, he learned to lie before he learned to talk. With China, if you turn the other cheek, they just stab you in the neck. Speaker 1 (8:23) I mean... I mean, with China, you can reach out a hand in friendship, but they'll just f*** your cousin. Speaker 1 (8:42) Old Senator Kennedy looks more bothered than a hot fox slapping a cold chicken in a warm river. Speaker 1 (8:50) It doesn't bother me. Speaker 8 (8:56) Well, he's not bothered either. Nothing? No. No cutesy. You know what's sad? The only Republican with balls to say what a bad idea this summit is, is Donald Trump. Speaker 5 (9:10) We have the president of China come a few months ago to Washington, and we give him a state dinner. Now, when people are screwing you, you don't give them state dinners. I would not be throwing him a dinner. I'd be Speaker 1 (9:23) throwing him a banquet. Speaker 1 (9:26) And there'll be flowers. Speaker 1 (9:29) And they'll be dancing. And afterwards, we're all gonna go look at the boop! Speaker 1 (9:37) There'll be food and people dressed up and we're gonna talk about granite. Speaker 1 (9:49) I found it amusing as well. Speaker 1 (9:52) But of course. Speaker 1 (9:54) It is not the first time the media has tried to make a meal of Speaker 8 (9:59) Republicans' dissatisfaction with Donald Trump. Speaker 3 (10:01) Republican revolt. Speaker 4 (10:03) Republicans are starting to hit the panic button. The president's approval rating is at an all-time low. Speaker 3 (10:08) Breaking ranks. Republicans distance themselves from President Trump. Top Republicans break with President Trump just weeks before the midterms. Openly breaking with the president over the war in Iran. Openly? Speaker 8 (10:22) Well, I guess if Trump wasn't weakened, I mean... Would any Republican have the balls to come out against the Iran war like Senator Husted of Ohio? Speaker 3 (10:33) Senator John Husted, up for reelection in Ohio, told Politico tonight, quote, the war needs to come to an end as quickly as possible so that we can lower gas prices. Speaker 8 (10:43) He is taking a stand. Now, obviously, many would prefer that an anti-war position would come in the form of a moral judgment about the shedding of innocent blood and the folly of man's desire for conquest and not necessarily 554 Speaker 1 (10:55) for regular. What the? Speaker 8 (10:59) But we take it here as we can get it. So long as Senator Houston of Ohio backs up his stirring rhetoric with a yes vote to end this reckless war of choice. I take you now to the floor of the United States Senate. Mr. Husted, Mr. Husted, no. You know, courage can take many forms. Speaker 8 (11:21) Although that does not appear Speaker 1 (11:22) to be one of the forms that it takes. But the point is... It's just sad, really. Speaker 8 (11:30) The point is, Houston's up for re-election. His constituents hate this war, and chances are most of them don't get C-SPAN. Now, why in God's name would we continue to fall for this? Why are we constantly believing that there are cracks in the MAGA fortress? We do because that's what we are told over and over again. Is Speaker 3 (11:53) MAGA cracking? New cracks emerge in the president's armor. A crack in the Republican Party's blind loyalty. The first big Speaker 1 (12:00) crack Speaker 3 (12:01) in the wall. His party is turning on him. His base is fracturing. The dam is starting to break. Speaker 1 (12:10) If the dam breaks, it'll be a flood. Speaker 4 (12:15) It's going to be a flood, right? A break in the dam, in the Trump dam, that it doesn't mean that you're going to get a flood, but it means you at least Speaker 1 (12:24) have Speaker 4 (12:25) a Speaker 1 (12:25) leak. Speaker 1 (12:31) But you told us to damn it! Speaker 1 (12:34) And now it's, is the MAGA coalition finally showing a small wet spot on the front of its pants? Speaker 8 (12:43) And the media's been doing this to us for f***ing ever. If it's not China and Iran, it was the Epstein files. The Trump presidency, as we have known it, is over. It is not. Speaker 3 (12:56) Cracks are emerging among Republicans over the government shutdown. Cracks in the Republican wall are starting to show up. Exposing some cracks within the GOP. Starting to Speaker 4 (13:05) see some cracks emerge. Trump fever breaks and it's in the process of breaking right now. That Speaker 3 (13:10) Trump fever seems to be breaking. I get the sense there might be a dam breaking. Speaker 1 (13:18) It's breaking news! Speaker 1 (13:25) And we can keep going back even further, like when candidate Trump attacked John McCain's military service in 2015! Speaker 4 (13:32) I do think it's the beginning of the end of the marriage between Donald Trump and the Republican Party. Speaker 1 (13:37) IT'S NOT- Speaker 1 (13:48) He's not dead. He