There’s been a lot of harsh words written and spoken the last few days about Donald Trump’s immigration policy which demands that families who are caught crossing the U.S. border illegally, even if they are seeking asylum, have children separated from their parents and placed in camps and detainment centers. Jimmy Kimmel was disgusted by the actions as he opened his own in his monologue on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” Monday night.
“What a week this has been. Just when you thought we couldn’t go any lower as a nation, we have,” Kimmel said. “I’m sure you’ve seen the heartbreaking and horrific images of families literally being torn apart thanks to the Trump administration and their zero tolerance immigration policy. Thousands of children have been taken away from their parents. It’s absolutely sickening to see kids put into cages. Unless you work for ‘Fox & Friends,’ in which case they might not be cages at all.”
Kimmel then cued a video of “Fox & Friends” host Steve Doocy providing some commentary over footage of children locked in a detainment center and acting like everything is cool.
“This is of a former warehouse that has been converted to a facility. And you know, while some have likened it to — them to concentration camps or cages, you do see that they have those thermal blankets. You do see some fencing. but keep in mind, some of have referred to them as cages but keep in mind, this is a great big warehouse facility where they built walls out of chain-link fences.”
“Oh. They’re not cages. They’re walls built out of chain-link fences,” Kimmel said after the clip. “What do you call those?”
Kimmel’s audience responded to the question by yelling “cages!” in unison.
“Oh, cages. Right. Exactly,” Kimmel said. “Some people are comparing the situation to the movie ‘Sophie’s Choice.’ I don’t know that that’s fair. In ‘Sophie’s Choice’ the Nazis only made Meryl Streep give up one of her kids.”
The crowd groaned at the joke, and Kimmel turned and pointed at his house band, prompting a rimshot from the drummer. “Thank you,” Kimmel said.
In case you aren’t familiar with “Sophie’s Choice,” the titular choice comes when Sophie, played by Meryl Streep, and her two children, a boy and a girl, are taken to the concentration camp at Auschwitz — the Nazis demand she choose one of her children to be taken to the gas chamber and the other would go with her into the work camp.
“President Trump claims he hates this policy, even though it is 100 percent without question his policy, and a policy. And he could stop it immediately if he wanted to. But of course, he’s playing the opposite game and blaming Democrats.”
“Jimmy Kimmel Live!” then played a clip from Trump’s speech Monday morning in which he said: “Immigration is the fault in all of the problems that we’re having because we cannot get them to sign legislation. We cannot get them even to the negotiating table. And I say it’s very strongly the Democrats’ fault. Their obstruction. They’re really obstructionist. And they are obstructing. The United States will not be a migrant camp, and it will not be a refugee holding facility. It won’t be.”
“Well, it is,” Kimmel said. “And so what are you going to do about that?”
Trump, in that same speech: “We’re going to have the Space Force.”
“That’s right. They’re going to have a Space Force,” Kimmel said. “To get us all off this planet He’s destroying.”
You can watch Monday’s episode of “Jimmy Kimmel Live” on ABC.com here or on the ABC app.