The ‘Daily Show’s Josh Johnson Thinks Trump Will Pardon Diddy

It’s very hard to continue to mine the Trump-Epstein ordeal for any more comedy. We’re at the bottom of the barrel when it comes to new material. Every bad thing we’re thinking Trump might do or probably already did has been discussed. There’s no room to truly shock us any more, and if you’re still feeling surprised about the depths of depravity, you’re naive. It’s why so many of the jokes about Donald Trump feel flat; they’re built on the premise that his actions are still shocking. 

Thankfully, then, Daily Show host Josh Johnson’s latest hour-long special — sets he releases weekly on YouTube — takes a different approach to the Epstein files. It isn’t, “Can you believe this is happening?”; it’s, “Of course, this is happening.” 

Johnson starts by describing some of the most recent developments in the Epstein case — his prime accomplice and the only person in prison in relation to any of the crimes, Ghislaine Maxwell, was recently moved to a federal minimum security facility in Florida. The same one that Jen Shah and Elizabeth Holmes are currently incarcerated in, as fans of the Real Housewives franchise and blood scams are well aware. The move coincided with Trump publicly considering whether or not he’d pardon Maxwell, something he still refuses to provide a yes or no answer to. 

At this, the crowd breaks into boos. “Yeah. No, I agree. I’m not a fan of it,” Johnson pans. “She’s not here. I’m not a fan. I hope she can feel your boos.” The reaction sets Johnson up perfectly for his next joke, obviously aimed at some of the audience who felt the need to boo at the concept of Trump pardoning Maxwell. 

“I feel sorry for my friends who didn’t see it coming because they still believed in a system, and they still believed in laws and they believed that jail existed for a reason, you know?” Johnson says. “And I’m, um, Black, so I kind of saw a good portion of this coming. Anyone who’s genuinely shocked that Ghislaine Maxwell might get a pardon has never watched The First 48 before.”

Johnson continues, saying that the pardoning of Maxwell is practically a foregone conclusion. “There are so many ties to Donald Trump — Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein — that even a pardon just feels like it would be happening in our faces, right? There’s no misunderstanding about the conflict of interest. There’s no misunderstanding about what her role is if she does testify in front of Congress or whoever. There’s no misunderstanding about what the quid pro quo is between the two of them.”

But Trump isn’t going to be satisfied just pardoning one sex criminal. “Even in that moment, on top of all that, Donald Trump floats pardoning Diddy,” Johnson adds. “And it’s like that one doesn’t even have anything to do with you — I don’t think.”

Johnson, who at one point in the set describes Diddy as “the devil’s version of Elf on the Shelf,” doesn’t deny the prospect of Trump pardoning Diddy is insane. “Why would you bother pardoning him? Like, he might already be walking out of jail that day. That’s such a crazy thing to do,” Johnson says. “You don’t have enough going on with everybody thinking you were like on an island 152 times or whatever?”

In Johnson’s set, Trump pardoning Diddy is a forgone conclusion. It’s the next logical step in an illogical but unsurprising series of events. We only have one hope left if the course is going to change: Diddy’s biggest hater, 50 Cent.

“When 50 Cent heard that Donald Trump was floating a pardon for Diddy, he went to work,” Johnson jokes. “He did what he does best — he trolled. 50 Cent just started posting everything bad that Diddy ever said about Donald Trump and tagging Donald Trump.” 

Who knows if Trump will actually pardon Maxwell or Diddy. But it’s clear comedy working from that framework is resonating. In less than 24 hours, the hour-long set has been viewed more than half a million times — or more than double the views Jimmy Fallon’s monologue received on YouTube in the same period of time.