Stephen Colbert riffed Paramount Global’s $16 million settlement of Donald Trump‘s lawsuit, calling the payment a “big fat bribe” and joking about the prospects that new owner Skydance will try pressure him to back off from humor directed at the president.
In a clip from Monday’s The Late Show posted on social media, Colbert joked in his monologue, “As someone who has always been a proud employee of this network, I am offended, and I don’t know if anything will ever repair my trust in this company. But just taking a stab at it, I’d say $16 million would help.”
Colbert was off when Paramount and Trump’s team announced the settlement earlier this month. Trump had sued CBS over the way that 60 Minutes edited an interview with Kamala Harris in the lead up to the 2024 election. Many legal experts saw the lawsuit as meritless, and so did the Paramount-CBS’ legal team, but the company needs Trump administration approval for its merger with Skydance.
Colbert also said in his monologue, “This settlement is for a nuisance lawsuit Trump filed, claiming that 60 Minutes deceptively edited their interview with then-candidate Kamala Harris last fall. Paramount knows they could have easily fought it because in their own words, the lawsuit was ‘completely without merit.’ And keep in mind, Paramount produced Transformers: Rise of the Beast. They know completely without merit.”
Colbert added, “Now, unlike the payoffs from ABC and Twitter, Paramount’s settlement did not include an apology. That’s good. Instead, the corporation released a statement where they said, ‘You may take our money, but you will never take our dignity. You may, however, purchase our dignity for the low, low price of $16 million. We need the cash.’”
“Now, I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles: It’s big fat bribe, because this all comes as Paramount’s owners are trying to get the Trump administration to approve the sale of our network to a new owner, Skydance.”
Colbert also showed a headline from Puck. “Some of the TV typers out there are blogging that once Skydance gets CBS, the new owner’s desire to please Trump could put pressure on late night host and frequent Trump critic Stephen Colbert.” Colbert then pointed to his new mustache. “But how are they going to put pressure on Stephen Colbert if they can’t find him?”
In announcing the settlement, Paramount said the “lawsuit is completely separate from, and unrelated to, the Skydance transaction and the FCC approval process.” The transaction is still pending before the FCC. Some lawmakers, like Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) have called for an investigation to see if anti-bribery laws were broken.
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