In the post-election fallout, it’s rare to find liberals talking sense about how Democrats imploded and what to make of President-elect Donald Trump and his supporters. Yet, one unexpected New York liberal who has proven time and again that he gets it is Jon Stewart.
The former Daily Show host and best-selling author Chris Smith sat down with James Poniewozik from the New York Times for “TimesTalks” last Wednesday to discuss their new book “The Daily Show (The Book): An Oral History as Told by Jon Stewart, the Correspondents, Staff and Guests.” However, the conversation quickly shifted to the 2016 election.
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Stewart started by criticizing Trump over his meeting with David Petraeus, who pleaded guilty to mishandling classified material. Over the course of his campaign, Trump repeatedly ripped Hillary Clinton over her private email server advocating that she should be prosecuted for mishandling classified information. He also hit Trump over his nomination of former Goldman Sachs investment banker Steven Mnuchin as Treasury secretary.
However, Stewart wouldn’t let liberal talking points dominate his analysis. He simply wouldn’t be baited into calling all Trump supporters ‘racist.’
“I know a lot of first responders,” Stewart said. “I spent a lot of time in that community. A sh*tload of them voted for Trump.”
He continued by echoing a familiar point made at the Republican National Convention, saying, “The same people that voted for Trump ran into burning buildings and saved whoever the f*ck they could no matter what color they were, no matter what religion and they would do it again tomorrow.”
Stewart was then challenged on his point by someone in the audience who noted that Trump supporters, who aren’t racist, “are giving tacit support to a man of racist language.”
He immediately rebuked that notion by saying that many Americans are guilty of exploitative and damaging systems as long as they “don’t affect us that badly.” Stewart then pointed to his friend’s iPhone to illustrate the harsh conditions many workers have to deal with to make such a device.
“I was like, ‘Guess how those are made, guess who makes them?’ ‘Oh yeah, but that’s …’ ‘What, what is it?’ It’s not different, we all do that. All of our sh*t stinks and getting beyond that takes incredible work,” Stewart explained.
The former Daily Show host then went on to reiterate a point he made to CBS “This Morning” with Charlie Rose that this country is the same before the election as it was after it.
“The only thing I would tell everybody to hearten is we’re still the same country. Obama didn’t change and fix everything and Trump can’t ruin everything.”
