Late-Night Mulls Over Trump’s Obsession With TikTok

On their respective late-night shows, Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers questioned President Donald Trump’s decision to turn the full force of his presidency on getting rid of TikTok in the middle of a pandemic and economic downturn.

Trump has cited national security concerns as the reason for possibly banning TikTok in the United States — due to the app’s ties to China and the risk of the Chinese government gaining access to American users’ data. It surely has nothing “to do with the TikTok teens who sabotaged his Tulsa rally,” Fallon cracked as he rifled through a variety of one-liners.

The host then threw out a few more punchlines about the president’s decision: “Trump is playing hardball with China. If he bans TikTok, China will only be able to spy on our phones, TVs, cars and refrigerator. So, that’s where he draws the line.” He also noted the app’s potential sale to the not-exactly-cool tech behemoth Microsoft, cracking: “It’s a big day for the three TikTok fans that also love Excel spreadsheets.”

Over on Late Night, Meyers joked that Trump was also considering a ban on Candy Crush — “We don’t want criminals like the Jelly Queen and Cupcake Carl coming into our country,” he joked in his Trump voice — and quipped, “I’m almost certain Trump has no idea what TikTok is. I’m betting TikTok was one of the answers he wrote on his cognitive test.”

Meyers argued that making such over-the-top proclamations is just something Trump likes to do. “He loves to stand on the White House lawn next to a giant whirring helicopter and shout empty pronouncements at reporters because it makes him feel like he’s actually the president and not just some soulless husk who fell ass-backward into a job he wasn’t qualified for because some dummy made fun of him at a dinner once,” Meyers breathlessly joked, turning it on himself at the end in a nod to his cracks about Trump at the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner.