John Oliver was pleasantly surprised that Republicans finally elected a new Speaker of the House last week, but not at all surprised about some of the views said speaker holds.
Rep. Mike Johnson was elected on Tuesday, drawing some confusion as even some of his own colleagues had no idea who he was. Rep. Susan Collins admitted she was going to have to Google him, which Oliver delighted in. But, as he pointed out, that Google search didn’t work out in Johnson’s favor, as people discovered how far-right he actually is.
Oliver then played a supercut of those discoveries Sunday night, which included Johnson calling abortion “a holocaust” that happens daily. But Oliver wasn’t overly phased.
“Let’s face it, it’s not like the new Republican speaker wasn’t going to have a laundry list of horrifying opinions,” he joked. “Honestly, it would be more surprising if he threw a couple of good ones in there too.”
The HBO host then offered some opinions that might get sprinkled in with the others.
“He believes abortion is a holocaust, that Friday should be part of the weekend, gay marriage is inherently unnatural, we need more women in STEM and there should be parks where adults can ride down the giant inflatable slide they use when planes crash,” Oliver mocked.
Oliver stopped there though, acknowledging that there would likely be a lot more to cover about Johnson in the coming weeks.