John Oliver Calls 2020 Election Results a "Reverse 9/11"

On Sunday's Last Week Tonight (recorded on Saturday), John Oliver distilled the feeling of being in New York City after Joe Biden's defeat of Donald Trump down to a very locally appropriate notion. "There was a mood here that could only be described as a 'reverse 9/11.' Why? Because it combined complete euphoria, an abiding disgust for Rudy Giuliani, and this time, people were actually dancing on the rooftops in New Jersey. It was a really good day. Never forget."

Oliver then mapped out the "absolute year of a week" as it happened, starting by chiding the media for its inability to pace itself. "At the start of this week, we all knew that, due to the pandemic, this election was going to be different — crucially, that it was going to require more patience than usual. Yet for some reason, as soon as Tuesday came around, everyone seemed to immediately forget that, because starting that evening, almost every news channel was overtaken by some version of a guy playing with a big screen while someone comes in to interrupt and pester them with questions. It was basically the equivalent of watching the security footage at a Best Buy for four straight days."

He also broke down the Trump campaign's voter fraud claims, focusing on how flimsy their evidence has been and how their lawsuits have thus far been dismissed so quickly and harshly that this is "officially the single sassiest week in the history of the judiciary. They must have traded in their gavels for umbrellas, because these jurists are throwing some shade." 

After showing a clip of Pennsylvania's Lt. Governor John Fetterman referring to Giuliani's unfounded claims of victory as "a bad House of Cards episode," Oliver furthered the comparison. "This is like House of Cards in that it's full of political intrigue, there's a sexual predator pretending to be president at the very heart of it, and it's gone for at least four seasons too long." 

The bottom line, though is that "Trump lost this election," Oliver affirmed. "He lost. All that bulls--t which we've grown accustomed to seeing work, did not work this time. And it's not like Trump and his family are going to stop. They're going to carry on grifting and lying like they've always done, but once he's out of the White House, it's just not going to have the same effect anymore. It's not going to directly impact every American's life, and that alone is f---ing fantastic."

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Andy Hunsaker has a head full of sitcom gags and nerd-genre lore, and can be followed @AndyHunsaker if you're into that sort of thing.