Comedian Hasan Minhaj slammed President Donald Trump and members of his administration Saturday night during the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner (WHCA) in Washington, D.C.
The Daily Show correspondent called Trump the “liar-in-chief,” ripped the president’s immigration policy, and fired off several personal insults at Vice President Mike Pence and Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
“Welcome to the series finale of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner,” Minhaj’s politically-charged monologue began.
“The leader of our country is not here. And that’s because he lives in Moscow,” Minhaj said to applause from the crowd of celebrities, politicians, and journalists, many of them from the country’s largest media organizations.
President Trump was headlining a first 100 days rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania — his absence from the WHCD marks the first time in 36 years that a sitting president has missed the event.
“I think he’s in Pennsylvania because he can’t take a joke” Minhaj said of the commander-in-chief.
“This event is about celebrating the first amendment and free speech,” Minhaj said.
“Donald Trump doesn’t care about free speech,” he added.
Minhaj said he was asked not to mock the Trump White House in the president’s absence from the event, but he wasted no time taking aim at Pence, saying the Vice President’s wife wouldn’t let him attend the annual event “because apparently one of you ladies is ovulating.”
“He tweets at 3 a.m. sober. Who is tweeting at 3 a.m. sober?” Minhaj said of the president. “Donald Trump – because it’s 10 a.m. in Russia. Those are business hours.”
The crowd of journalists cringed as Minhaj turned his scorn toward Sessions.
“Jeff Sessions could not be here tonight. He is doing a pre-civil war enactment. On his RSVP he wrote, ‘No.’ Just ‘no’ — Which happens to be his second favorite n-word,” Minhaj said to an audible groan from the crowd.
Minhaj also called White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon a Nazi.
“Now a lot of people think that Steve Bannon is the reason Donald Trump is a racist,” he said. “That is not true. Is he here? I do not see Steve Bannon. I do not see Steve Bannon. Not see. Nazi Steve Bannon. Nazi Steve Bannon.”
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer was also slammed during Minhaj’s screed.
“Spicer isn’t here tonight because I think he’s at home Googling how to fake his own death,” he said.
Minhaj, who is a Muslim, opened his monologue with a joke about the speculation that former President Barack Obama is a Muslim.
“Who would have thought with everything going on in the country right now that a Muslim would be standing on this stage for a ninth year in a row, baby,” Minhaj joked.
“Only in America can a first generation Indian Muslim kid get on this stage and make fun of the president — the orange man behind the Muslim ban,” he added.
The Comedy Central star also roasted Fox News and slammed the network’s former primetime anchor Bill O’Reilly.
“I’m amazed Fox News even showed up—It’s hard to trust you guys when you backed a man like Bill O’Reilly for years,” Minhaj said to audible boos from the audience. “You gave O’Reilly a $25M severance package — only package he won’t force a woman to touch.”
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