{"id":593095,"date":"2026-04-29T11:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T11:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=593095"},"modified":"2026-04-29T11:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T11:54:15","slug":"something-changed-after-trump-settlement-colbert-says-cbs-booting-him-for-bad-ratings-seems-fishy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=593095","title":{"rendered":"Something changed after Trump settlement: Colbert says CBS booting him for bad ratings \u2018seems fishy\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Outgoing late-night host Stephen Colbert still remains convinced that there\u2019s something fishy about his low-rated show\u2019s cancellation.<\/p>\n

CBS announced in July that his show would end this May because of \u201cfinancial\u201d reasons attributable to advertising revenue, shifting viewing habits, and the show\u2019s lack of sustainability.<\/p>\n

\n

GOOD NEWS!! CBS cancels \u201cThe Late Show,\u201dStephen Colbert. Another Trump win for Americans. \"\ud83e\udd73\" pic.twitter.com\/X58uYq4XCi<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 \"\u2728\"Rojas\"\u2728\" (@mcucolo57) July 18, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

But speaking with the New York Times<\/a>, Colbert theorized that the financial problems at CBS were instead attributable to a lawsuit the network settled with President Donald Trump in early July.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do not dispute their rationale [for cancelling the show],\u201d Colbert said. \u201cI do make jokes about it. But I also completely understand why people would say, A, that doesn\u2019t make sense to me, and B, that seems fishy to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Why fishy? Because, according to him, CBS \u201cdid it [hurt their own finances] to themselves by bending the knee to the Trump administration over a $20 billion, settled for $16 million, completely frivolous lawsuit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Except the lawsuit wasn\u2019t frivolous. It is an easily observable fact that CBS News fraudulently edited an interview with then-Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024 to make her look good ahead of her election against then-GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\ud83d\udea8\"\"\ud83d\udea8\" BREAKING: CBS\u2019 parent company has just agreed to pay President Trump $16 MILLION after they deceptively edited Kamala\u2019s 60 Minutes interview pic.twitter.com\/DeyD3JOYEO<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 JOSH DUNLAP (@JDunlap1974) July 2, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s possible that two things can be true,\u201d Colbert continued. \u201cBroadcast can be in trouble. They cannot monetize because of things like YouTube, because of the competition of streaming. They\u2019ve got the books, and I do not have any desire to debate them over what they say their business model is and how it does not work for them anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut less than two years before they called to say it\u2019s over, they were very eager for me to be signed for a long time. So, something changed,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Two years prior to the show\u2019s cancellation, Colbert didn\u2019t spend every second on live air trashing the presidency because then-President Joe Biden, a rabid Democrat, was in office.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\ud83d\udea8\" NEW: \u201cStephen Colbert is afraid to have the President on his show. He has a very unhealthy obsession with him, mentioning him in almost every monologue. He\u2019s conditioned his audience to see Trump as this bad, scary, authoritarian figure,\u201d adds Fox News\u2019 Caroline Sunshine.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/iVsGiXWvVh<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 TV News Now (@TVNewsNow) February 19, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

That said, the late-night host intends to end things with CBS amicably.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have zero desire to have a contentious relationship with my network,\u201d he told the Times. \u201cI\u2019ve really liked working with CBS. They\u2019ve been great partners. And I\u2019d like to end it that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEleven years is a long time to work here. And almost 10 years before that, almost 21 years altogether, in late-night. I feel so much better to be \u2018grateful for\u2019 than to be \u2018mad about,’\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Continuing his remarks, Colbert took shots at the Trump administration at large, including the Federal Communications Commission, for allegedly trying to censor him.<\/p>\n

\u201cAuthoritarians don\u2019t like anybody who doesn\u2019t give them undue dignity,\u201d he said. \u201cComedians are anti-authoritarian by nature. And authoritarians are never going to like anybody to laugh at them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe number of newspeople who have said to me or Jon Stewart or any of the guys who do this, \u2018God, I wish I could say what you say on air.\u2019 And we can. I think that upsets them. I think it might be upsetting that we really do not live in their world of principalities and powers,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Yet the late-night host claimed not to be a partisan actor.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a problem with Trump being a complete narcissist who is only working for his own interest and does not appear to care if the entire world burns. That\u2019s not a partisan position,\u201d he swore. \u201cI have eyeballs and ears, and I think calling late-night partisan is just roughing the ref.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd we don\u2019t even want to be refs, but they perceive us as refs. I reject the partisan description. Partisan means you\u2019re never, ever going to make a joke about a Democrat, and that\u2019s just not true. There\u2019s just no comparison of how fertile the fields are,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Outgoing late-night host Stephen Colbert still remains convinced that there\u2019s something fishy about his low-rated show\u2019s cancellation. CBS announced in July that his show would end this May because of \u201cfinancial\u201d reasons attributable to advertising revenue, shifting viewing habits, and the show\u2019s lack of sustainability. GOOD NEWS!! CBS cancels \u201cThe Late Show,\u201dStephen Colbert. Another Trump… Continue reading Something changed after Trump settlement: Colbert says CBS booting him for bad ratings \u2018seems fishy\u2019<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":593096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[17,22,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-593095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-border-security","category-immigration","category-immigration-reform","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=593095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/593096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=593095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=593095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=593095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}