{"id":220662,"date":"2026-01-07T02:43:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T02:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/220662\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T02:43:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T02:43:12","slug":"trump-just-wants-to-distract-from-epstein-files","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/220662\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Just Wants to ‘Distract’ From Epstein Files"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jimmy Kimmel accused President Donald Trump Monday night of using the arrest of Venezuelan dictator Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a> to distract Americans from the Epstein Files.<\/p>\n

\u201cDonald Trump did so much crazy stuff over the last two weeks it would take a nine-part Ken Burns documentary series to cover it all,\u201d the \u201cJimmy Kimmel Live!\u201d<\/a> host noted at the top of his monologue. \u201cBut I\u2019m going to do my best to boil it down.\u201d At the center of much of the segment was, of course, Trump\u2019s invasion of Venezuela and capture of Maduro.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you were wondering how bad these Epstein Files<\/a> are for Trump, turns out they\u2019re Invade Venezuela Bad,\u201d Kimmel said. The late night host went on to draw parallels between Trump\u2019s actions over the past week and the events of an oft-forgotten 1997 film. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is literally the plot of the movie \u2018Wag the Dog.\u2019 The president gets caught in a sex scandal, so he attacks a smaller country to distract us,\u201d Kimmel explained. \u201cAnd here we are \u2014 distracted.\u201d You can watch Kimmel\u2019s full Monday monologue yourself in the video below.<\/p>\n

Kimmel mocked Trump for telling reporters that he and his administration will \u201crun\u201d Venezuela for the time being until a \u201cjudicious\u201d transition of power can take place. \u201cI think he might be gargling Nyquil or something,\u201d Kimmel remarked. \u201cHe\u2019s going to run Venezuela? He can\u2019t even run the country he runs!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor 10 years, he\u2019s been promising this plan for healthcare. Now, he\u2019s running another country that I guarantee you he could not find on a map. I would bet anything on that,\u201d Kimmel continued. \u201cWhat is he thinking? Is running the United States not enough? I mean, if you\u2019re looking for a challenge, try a sit-up!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Referencing his ongoing rivalry with the president, Kimmel also took a moment Monday to ridicule the president for his poorly received stint hosting this year\u2019s Kennedy Center Honors. \u201cAfter boasting about what a great host he is and how much better he is than I am and how huge his ratings would be, Trump hosted the lowest-rated Kennedy Center Honors telecast of all time,\u201d Kimmel noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I recall, he said he would step down if this happened, right? He said, \u2018If I can\u2019t beat out Jimmy Kimmel, then I don\u2019t think I should be president,\u2019\u201d the \u201cJimmy Kimmel Live!\u201d host added, remarking, \u201cHey, a deal is a deal.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jimmy Kimmel accused President Donald Trump Monday night of using the arrest of Venezuelan dictator Nicol\u00e1s Maduro to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":220663,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[65,156,124611,7182,111,139,118516,69,437,41812],"class_list":["post-220662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-donald-trump","tag-entertainment","tag-epstein-files","tag-jimmy-kimmel-live","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nicolas-maduro","tag-nz","tag-tv","tag-venezuela"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220662","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220662"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220662\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220662"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220662"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220662"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}