Colbert Addresses Arrest of Triumph & His Crew at Capitol –“This Was First-Degree Puppetry…”

On last night’s Late Show, Stephen Colbert addressed the arrests of members of his production team at the U.S. Capitol building last week.

Among those arrested was SNL alum Robert Smigel, who has appeared a number of times as Triumph the Insult Comic Dog on The Late Show.

Colbert emphasized his crew had permission to be there,

After [the crew] finished their interviews, they were doing some last-minute puppetry and jokey make-em-ups in a hallway, when Triumph and my folks were approached and detained by the Capitol police — which actually isn’t that surprising.”
The Capitol police are much more cautious than they were, say, 18 months ago, and for a very good reason.

If you don’t know what that reason is, I know what news network you watch.

The Capitol police were just doing their job, my staff was just doing their job, everyone was very professional, everyone was very calm. My staffers were detained, processed and released.

A very unpleasant experience for my staff.”

Colbert then referenced Fox News’ coverage of the incident, with the cable news network suggesting the Late Show crew had caused an “insurrection” of their own.

First of all: what? Second of all: huh? Third of all, they weren’t in the Capitol building!

An insurrection involves disrupting the lawful actions of Congress and howling for the blood of elected leaders, all to prevent the peaceful transfer of power.

This was first-degree puppetry.

This was high jinks with intent to goof. Misappropriation of an old Conan bit.
Drawing any equivalence between rioters storming our Capitol to prevent the counting of electoral ballots and a cigar-chomping toy dog is a shameful and grotesque insult to the memory of everyone who died.”