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By Megan Cartwright
Associate News Editor
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Jon Stewart has mocked President Donald Trump's response to a report that he sent a "bawdy" birthday message to Jeffrey Epstein.
The Daily Show host also issued a foulmouthed message to CBS after the network canceled The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
Newsweek contacted Trump's representative for comment on Tuesday via email outside regular working hours.
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Why It Matters
In a statement posted on Truth Social, Trump said he had filed a "powerhouse lawsuit" against The Wall Street Journal over its report about a message he allegedly sent to Epstein, the late convicted sex offender, for his 50th birthday.
Last week also saw CBS announce that it is canceling The Late Show for financial reasons. The news came three days after host Stephen Colbert—a known critic of Trump—criticized the network's parent company, Paramount, over its $16 million settlement with the president. The incidents have sparked new concerns about the president's at times contentious relationship with traditional news outlets and his influence over the media.
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What To Know
Stewart—who is also a critic of Trump—took aim at the president over the Wall Street Journal article "Jeffrey Epstein's Friends Sent Him Bawdy Letters for a 50th Birthday Album. One Was From Donald Trump."
According to the report, Trump's message to Epstein included several lines of typed text framed by the hand-drawn outline of a naked woman. The report said Trump concluded his message, "Happy Birthday—and may every day be another wonderful secret."
"I f***ing threw up in my own mouth on that one," Stewart said of the note. "I don't even know what any of this means, but I do know that every line in that card sounds like the password you have to use to get into the orgy in Eyes Wide Shut."
Speaking to The Wall Street Journal, the president denied creating the image or writing the message, saying, "I never wrote a picture in my life."
He later wrote on Truth Social, "The Wall Street Journal printed a FAKE letter, supposedly to Epstein. These are not my words, not the way I talk. Also, I don't draw pictures."
Commenting on the president's responses to the report, Stewart said, "Donald Trump neither writes pictures nor draws pictures, which—as the experts will tell you—are the two leading causes of pictures."
Stewart also commented on CBS's cancellation of The Late Show.
"I acknowledge late-night TV is a struggling financial model. … But when your industry is faced with changes, you don't just call it a day," he said. "My God! When CDs stopped selling, they didn't just go, 'Oh well, music, it's been a good run.' The fact that CBS didn't try to save their No. 1 rated network late-night franchise that's been on the air for over three decades is part of what's making everybody wonder, Was this purely financial or maybe the path of least resistance for your $8 billion merger?"
Paramount and Skydance Media are working on merging in an $8 billion deal to form Paramount Skydance Corporation. Paramount also owns Comedy Central, where The Daily Show airs.
CBS said in a news release about the Late Show cancellation: "This is purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night. It is not related in any way to the show's performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount."
During Thursday's episode of The Late Show, Colbert said: "Before we start the show, I want to let you know something that I found out just last night. Next year will be our last season. The network will be ending The Late Show in May."
"Yeah, I share your feelings," he continued as the audience booed. "It's not just the end of our show, but it's the end of The Late Show on CBS. I'm not being replaced. This is all just going away."
Stewart said on Monday's episode of The Daily Show: "I understand the corporate fear. I understand the fear that you and your advertisers have with $8 billion at stake, but understand this, truly: The shows that you now seek to cancel, censor and control, a not insignificant portion of that $8 billion value came from those f***ing shows. That's what made you that money.
"Shows that say something, shows that take a stand, shows that are unafraid. Believe me, this is not a 'We speak truth to power.' We don't. We speak opinions to television cameras, but we try. We f***ing try every night. If you believe as corporations or as networks, you can make yourselves so innocuous, that you can serve a gruel so flavorless, that you will never again be on the boy king's radar, why will anyone watch you and you are f***ing wrong."
What People Are Saying
Last Week Tonight host John Oliver told the Associated Press about the Late Show cancellation: "It's very sad. I love, obviously, Stephen. I love his staff. I love that show. It's incredibly sad. I'm partly excited to see what they're going to do for the next 10 months."
The Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon said on his show: "Everybody is talking about CBS' decision to end The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, and many people are now threatening to boycott the network. CBS could lose millions of viewers plus tens of hundreds watching on Paramount+. Stephen has done years of incredibly smart and hilarious television, and he's won 10 Emmys."
Andy Cohen said on SiriusXM's Andy Cohen Live: "So CBS's whole thing is it was losing $40 million a year. Now, so suddenly this show is losing $40 million a year and they want to, and they're gonna cancel it. … I think it is possible that it's losing money, and typically what would happen if a show is losing money that is also super important to the network, which that show—and the late-night time slot—has been important to CBS for the last 25 years since Letterman began it on CBS at the Ed Sullivan Theater in like the mid-'90s. What they would probably do is say: 'Listen, Stephen, your show is losing X amount of money a year. There's two things we could do. We could cut the budget in half, maybe move out of the Ed Sullivan Theater. Do the show in a small studio that we already own'—because CBS has a lot of studio space.
"'Cut down on staff. You have 200 people working here. We needed to be 100 people or 60, and instead of you doing your show five days a week, we're gonna do your show four days a week, and you're gonna pretape your Thursday show, so you're actually gonna be in production three days a week.' That's a way right there to cut the budget at least in half. As opposed to saying out of nowhere—as he portrayed it, they called him in and said: 'Your show's losing money. We're canceling it in a year.'"
Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel wrote in a now-expired Instagram Stories post, per People: "Love you Stephen. F*** you and all your Sheldons CBS."
What Happens Next
The Late Show With Stephen Colbert is scheduled to end in May 2026.
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