Jon Stewart returned to The Daily Show this week with a monologue that wasted no time targeting President Donald Trump's escalating feud with the Vatican and a now-deleted AI-generated image that depicted the president as Jesus Christ.
Trump had recently clashed with Pope Leo XIV over the pontiff's calls for peace amid the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran. Stewart's advice? Reconciliation. "You gotta remember that at the end of the day you and the Catholic Church both historically care deeply about the same thing — covering up sex scandals," Stewart said to audience laughter.
The host then pivoted to what he called the worse development: Trump's posting of an AI image showing himself in messianic robes, apparently healing a figure that bore a striking resemblance to Stewart himself. "I didn't realize my look had reached leper territory," the comedian deadpanned, spending several moments squinting at the image in mock horror. "This is freaking me the fuck out."
When a reporter later asked Trump about the backlash, the president claimed the image depicted him as a doctor, not Jesus. Stewart was unimpressed. "Do you even care about lying to us anymore?" he asked. "Your lies used to have a real spark: 'They're eating the cats and dogs, Venezuela stole the 2020 election.' And now the best you've got is: 'Oh, was it Jesus? I'm a doctor.'"
As Deadline reported, Stewart closed his monologue on a more hopeful note, pointing to the decisive electoral defeat of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a far-right Trump ally. Stewart framed the result as a sign that authoritarian populism may be losing its grip. "The air of Donald Trump's invincibility is being slowly eroded by world events," he said. "There is hope."
