{"id":242598,"date":"2025-10-27T03:03:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-27T03:03:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/242598\/"},"modified":"2025-10-27T03:03:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T03:03:07","slug":"jon-stewart-says-hes-working-on-staying-on-as-daily-show-host","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/242598\/","title":{"rendered":"Jon Stewart Says He\u2019s \u201cWorking on Staying\u201d on as \u2018Daily Show\u2019 Host"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jon Stewart has said he\u2019s not going anywhere<\/a>, and he\u2019s trying to put that in writing.<\/p>\n

The comedian, whose contract to host The Daily Show is up in December<\/a>, said \u201cwe\u2019re working on staying\u201d during a conversation with New Yorker editor David Remnick at Sunday\u2019s New Yorker Festival, when Remnick asked if the Comedy Central host was going to \u201csign another\u201d contract.<\/p>\n

More from The Hollywood Reporter<\/p>\n

Beyond that, when asked by Remnick if he does indeed want to stay at the helm of the Comedy Central late night show he left in 2015 and returned to in early 2024, <\/a>hosting on Mondays<\/a>, Stewart agreed. If it\u2019s up to him, he wants to stay.<\/p>\n

It was roughly a year ago when Stewart announced he was staying on at The Daily Show through December 2025<\/a>, but since then Donald Trump has returned to the White House and Paramount has merged with David Ellison\u2019s Skydance.<\/p>\n

Stewart even referred to Paramount Skydance CEO Ellison, the son of Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, as his \u201cnew boss.\u201d<\/p>\n

In recent months, Stewart\u2019s Paramount colleague and former Daily Show co-worker Stephen Colbert announced that CBS\u2019 The Late Show would be ending<\/a>, and ABC\u2019s Jimmy Kimmel had his show suspended. CBS, which like Comedy Central is owned by Paramount, announced in July that Colbert\u2019s The Late Show would come to an end in May 2026. Though the network claimed it was \u201cpurely a financial decision,\u201d the move came just days after Colbert criticized Paramount for a $16 million settlement<\/a> with Trump in a lawsuit he had filed over the editing of a 60 Minutes interview with his 2024 Democratic challenger Kamala Harris. ABC\u2019s Jimmy Kimmel Live! was suspended for less than a week<\/a> after comments Kimmel made in a monologue about conservative activist Charlie Kirk\u2019s assassin went viral, FCC commissioner Brendan Carr threatened ABC\u2019s affiliate licenses over the host\u2019s remarks and at least two affiliate groups, Nexstar and Sinclair, planned to pre-empt Kimmel\u2019s show.<\/p>\n

Stewart too has criticized the 60 Minutes settlement and suggested that the Late Show cancellation was connected to Colbert\u2019s critical comments about the lawsuit and President Trump. And he skewered the Kimmel suspension with a satirical, \u201cadministration-compliant\u201d edition of The Daily Show<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that CBS didn\u2019t try to save their No. 1 rated late night franchise that\u2019s been on the air for over three decades is part of what\u2019s making everybody wonder: Was this \u2018purely financial\u2019? Or maybe it\u2019s the path of least resistance for your $8 billion merger to kill a show that you know rankled a fragile and vengeful president who\u2019s so insecure that he\u2019s suffering terribly from a case of chronic penis insufficiency,\u201d Stewart said on The Daily Show<\/a> days after news broke of The Late Show cancellation.<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cIf you\u2019re trying to figure out why Stephen\u2019s show is ending, I don\u2019t think the answer can be found in some smoking gun email or phone call from Trump to CBS executives or in CBS QuickBooks spreadsheets on the financial health of late night. I think the answer is in the fear and pre-compliance that is gripping all of America\u2019s institutions at this very moment, institutions that have chosen not to fight the vengeful and vindictive actions of our \u2026 commander-in-chief. To those corporations and advertisers and universities and law firms, all of them, if you still think that bending the knee to Trump will save you, I have one thing to say [breaking into song]: I know you\u2019re scared, I know you\u2019re weary, I know your plans don\u2019t include me, but these are troubled times, so sack the fuck up!\u201d<\/p>\n

And he said at the time of his own late night future: \u201cI\u2019m not going anywhere. I think.\u201d<\/p>\n

Paramount Skydance has also made changes at CBS News. The conglomerate has hired the former CEO of the conservative-leaning Hudson Institute, Kenneth Weinstein, as CBS News\u2019 ombudsman<\/a> and contrarian journalist Bari Weiss as the editor-in-chief of CBS News<\/a>, with Paramount acquiring her The Free Press.<\/p>\n

When Remnick asked specifically about the \u201cI think\u201d comment on Sunday, Stewart merely quipped, \u201cI\u2019m neurotic,\u201d but he indicated throughout the conversation \u2014 which covered Trump\u2019s second term, Stewart\u2019s issues with the Democratic party and the dangers of social media algorithms \u2014 that he plans to keep fighting and urges others to do the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t compromise on what you do, and you do it until they tell you to leave,\u201d he said<\/p>\n

Stewart also spoke about his satirical approach to Kimmel\u2019s suspension.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it rattled everyone to some extent, but it also presented great opportunity, and so I don\u2019t know that we\u2019ve had as much fun as we did that Thursday morning, coming up with all the stupid little shit that you see, including, like, gold pictures and red ties. You know, it gave us some purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n

That said, Stewart argued that comedians aren\u2019t \u201cthe victims of this administration.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are a visible manifestation of certain things, but the victims are the victims are the people that are struggling to have any voice and are being forcibly removed from streets by hooded agents, those are the victims of this administration,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Stewart also spoke about the recent controversy over a number of comedians performing in Saudi Arabia, yet he took a more nuanced approach and seemed reluctant to attack those who performed at the Riyadh Comedy Festival<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t touch other people\u2019s money,\u201d he said, \u201cIt\u2019s hard, man.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought the only person who should\u2019ve done it was Pete Davidson, because they owe him money,\u201d he quipped, alluding to how Davidson\u2019s firefighter father famously died responding to the 9\/11 terrorist attacks.<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cI want to fix my house. I want to operate with integrity, but I don\u2019t want to gate keep. \u2026 I think a lot of comics who came out and really shit on those guys, I know a couple of them, and I know them actually to be. like, garbage humans, so it\u2019s hard for me to watch that sort of thing. I would prefer if they would have just come out and said, it\u2019s money and not, like, it\u2019s a way to start a conversation. Like, would you have started the conversation for $2,500? That\u2019s the difference. \u2026 We all have our lines that we are willing to cross \u2026 We get into a problem when we\u2019re unforgiving in any way, when we offer no grace. And that doesn\u2019t mean that I don\u2019t have lines that I draw \u2026 but I do try to not be so rigid in the way that I think society has become.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for Trump, Stewart pointed to his ability to tap into a dissatisfaction with the government and \u201charness the anger and catastrophizing\u201d of social media as explanations for his electoral victory.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a reason Donald Trump came to power, and that is that in the general populous mind, government no longer serves the interests of the people it purports to represent,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s a broad-based, deep feeling, and that helps when someone comes along and goes, the system is rigged, and people go, yeah, it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stewart was unsparing, though, in his critique of the Democratic party, condemning the party\u2019s \u201cpassivity\u2026 to stick with the status quo that most people felt was not working for their needs.\u201d<\/p>\n

And though he praised Zohran Mamdani\u2019s candidacy for New York City mayor, comments that earned cheers and applause in Manhattan\u2019s Webster Hall, Stewart struggled to name a national leader for the Democratic party.<\/p>\n

After pausing when he was asked, audience members suggested that Stewart himself could be that leader, which he saw as a sign of desperation and frustration.<\/p>\n

\u201cHave we really gotten to that point? \u2026 That\u2019s also a function of frustration, a cry of desperation. I\u2019m other; I\u2019m none of the above,\u201d he said, before later adding, \u201cThe Democratic party is ripe for what happened to the Republican party in 2016. But hopefully it will be somebody who uses that power for good and not for self aggrandizing and not for their own gratification.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still he did offer some indication of hope, pointing to the large attendance at the No Kings rallies<\/a> last weekend.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen 7 million people show up in America on a weekend for anything, I mean, honestly, anything,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re not Russia, and their history of autocracy or dictatorship \u2026 is an alien culture to us, and it is uncomfortable, and that discomfort may be our saving grace. And don\u2019t think we\u2019re going to wear that well. That doesn\u2019t mean we\u2019re not going to be in some kind of soft autocracy where news is controlled, but we have a lot of different avenues, and suppression creates opportunity and a populace that is thirsty for inspiration and leadership and morality and integrity \u2026 that\u2019s fertile ground for that opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Best of The Hollywood Reporter<\/p>\n

Sign up for THR’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jon Stewart has said he\u2019s not going anywhere, and he\u2019s trying to put that in writing. The comedian,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":242599,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[49,48,7178,18027,114068,1781,1376,75,4592,7179,20522,41673,9489,18225,3668,6513,23568,348],"class_list":["post-242598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-comedy-central","tag-david-ellison","tag-david-remnick","tag-democratic-party","tag-donald-trump","tag-entertainment","tag-jimmy-kimmel","tag-jon-stewart","tag-larry-ellison","tag-late-night-show","tag-paramount","tag-pete-davidson","tag-stephen-colbert","tag-the-daily-show","tag-the-hollywood-reporter","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/242599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}