{"id":5107,"date":"2026-08-09T17:05:44","date_gmt":"2026-08-09T17:05:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=5107"},"modified":"2026-08-09T17:05:44","modified_gmt":"2026-08-09T17:05:44","slug":"how-the-late-night-emmy-became-the-anti-trump-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=5107","title":{"rendered":"How the Late-Night Emmy Became the Anti-Trump Award"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<!-- do not apply CSS styles to this element! --><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>\n\t\u201cWe\u2019re waiting for the billboard.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\n\tSo said an insider at a (non-ABC) late night nominee to me when I asked what to make of the scrum in the variety series category \u2014 referring, of course, to Jimmy Kimmel\u2019s habit of taking out Emmys-season billboards.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=5105\">The 20 Most Unforgettable \u2018Real Housewives\u2019 Moments, Ranked<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\n\tLast year, Kimmel threw his weight behind\u00a0the recently canceled Stephen Colbert in a bid to get <em>The Late Show With Stephen Colbert<\/em>\u00a0its first-ever top late night Emmy. (It worked.) This year, Kimmel could do the same for his recently departed (from the airwaves) friend.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThen again, he could do something on behalf of himself. Or John Oliver. Or Jon Stewart. They\u2019re all pals. And all have a strong claim to the variety Emmy, which this season rolls all the hot late night shows together, putting perennial winner Oliver as well as\u00a0<em>SNL<\/em>\u00a0back with everyone else for one seriously supercharged group of nominees.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tBut variety is more than just a hot category because of the quality of the shows. It\u2019s a hot category because the top late night Emmy has become a vehicle \u2014 perhaps <em>the<\/em> vehicle \u2014 for Hollywood to register its opposition to President Trump. And the voters\u2019 pick will tell us a lot about whom they favor to lead that opposition for the remaining two years of his term.\u00a0(Hopefully they survive it.)<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThe commingling of late night and overtly liberal politics has been a narrative for a decade now, ever since Colbert\u2019s ratings skyrocketed (for engaging in them) and Jimmy Fallon\u2019s tanked (for not) in the president\u2019s first term. It can be hard to remember a time when Jay Leno made Monica Lewinsky jokes (or Stewart made Obama jokes) and we all laughed no matter our party affiliation, but it happened in our lifetimes. I think.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tYet since Trump\u2019s\u00a0return to power, late night\u2019s role as a domain of protest has been stronger than ever. Its Emmy is basically the anti-Trump award \u2014 Hollywood\u2019s place to anoint its chosen resistance figure for the year.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tIf you have any doubt about this, let it be dispelled by the following fact: <em>Real Time With Bill Maher<\/em>, whose host is by far the Trump-friendliest of the bunch, was often nominated for the top late night Emmy in a pre-Trump era \u2014 every year but one from 2005 to 2017. He\u2019s not been nominated since.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tSo, who wins the 2026 anti-Trump award?<\/p>\n<p>\n\tIn 2025, voters went with Colbert, with the host having gotten canceled just a month before phase two voting started.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tBut this year, every show has a claim to the mantle. Colbert again, as he recently wrapped his last season and feting him would be one more dunk on the president en route to the locker room.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tOliver and Stewart each have an argument, too. They regularly skewer Trump, going deep on not just his foibles but policy hypocrisies. Plus, they\u2019re both caught up in the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger, which, given David Ellison\u2019s ties to the president, many Emmys voters blame Trump for.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=5103\">\u2018PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie\u2019 Review: Busy New Entry in Pup Franchise Is Exactly What You\u2019d Expect<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\n<em>Saturday Night Live <\/em>via James Austin Johnson\/Lorne Michaels has been merciless in cold open after cold open, plus the Michael Che \u201cWhat\u2019s the worst that could happen?\u201d assassination joke in April that sparked a White House clapback.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tAnd then there\u2019s Kimmel, Target No. 1 of the administration, which got him suspended for five days in September for a joke after the Charlie Kirk assassination \u2014 then tried again after a pretty clear old-age joke in April. \u201cNormally would not be responsive to anything that he said but, this is something far beyond the pale,\u201d Trump fulminated on Truth Social. \u201cJimmy Kimmel should be immediately fired.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\n\tIn theory, this should be Kimmel\u2019s turn, given how he\u2019s embraced the anti-Trump role. (When I asked him what will ensure the future of late night, he said that \u201ca\u00a0different president would be a good start.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThough he has four Emmys for other work, Kimmel has never won for <em>Jimmy Kimmel Live! <\/em>in all 24 seasons of its airing. Then again, the TV Academy could show its appreciation by just handing him the game show host prize, as it did last year.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tAll of this isn\u2019t just Hollywood patting itself on the back, by the way, a self-congratulation that doesn\u2019t make a peep outside the echo chamber\/Peacock Theater. Whoever wins could be emboldened to lean in even more to anti-Trump resistance \u2014 especially key as the midterms are coming during this TV season. For all the GOP dismissals of the idea, American voters do watch late night and understand current affairs through its lens. The show that wins could gain more confidence to pursue MAGA \u2014 which could have a tangible impact on the elections (and, yes, drive Trump even crazier).<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThere\u2019s a final twist. Because of a rule change, more than one show could win outstanding variety series. Two could win. Three could win. In fact, <em>all five could win.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>\n\tThat\u2019s because Emmy voters aren\u2019t being asked to vote for one show over another \u2014 they\u2019re being asked whether each given nominee deserves an Emmy. Any show that hits 90 percent wins. (If none do, the highest wins.)<\/p>\n<p>\n\tNow, 90 percent is a high bar. But it could mean that all five of late night\u2019s key personalities \u2014 Colbert, Kimmel, Michaels, Stewart and Oliver \u2014 walk away from Emmy night as winners.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tTruth Social might just melt down.<\/p>\n<p>\n<em>This story first appeared in an August stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=5101\">In \u2018Demons,\u2019 Love and Betrayal Become a Metaphor for the Relationship Between Russia and Ukraine (Exclusive Trailer)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kimmel, Colbert or Oliver could each be anointed Hollywood&#039;s anti-White House avatar &#8212; and become even more emboldened to take on the president.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5106,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[245,120,826,827],"class_list":["post-5107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting","tag-awards","tag-donald-trump","tag-emmy-awards","tag-emmys-2026"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>How the Late-Night Emmy Became the Anti-Trump Award - 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