Colbert is off the air, and the sharpest Trump comedy now comes from Canadian public TV

Here is the documented timeline. On October 19, This Hour Has 22 Minutes, the CBC's long-running satire show, posted a sketch introducing Nicki Minaj as the next White House press secretary. On October 25, White House communications director Steven Cheung shared a video of himself with Minaj aboard Air Force One, captioned: "Ladies and gentlemen, I think we may have found the new White House Press Secretary!" Trump then called the idea "a good idea" while making no offer.

Satire usually chases the news by a week. On r/television, the fans who caught the reversed order drew the obvious conclusion:

"This is the show that gave the Trump admin the idea for Nikki Minaj to be the press secretary. Their sketch was posted on Youtube a few days before the Trump admin 'came up with' the idea. The morons are getting their real ideas from a satire sketch show!"

Whether anyone in Washington actually watched the sketch is unknowable. What's on the record is the order of events, and the order is: joke first, government second.

The sketch went up October 19. The White House communications director posted his version on October 25.

The show that got there first

This Hour Has 22 Minutes is not an upstart. It has run on Canada's public broadcaster since 1993, one of the longest-running comedy shows anywhere, and its alumni pipeline is serious: this is the series where Nathan Fielder got his start as a correspondent before Nathan for You and The Rehearsal. A second commenter in the thread pitched it to newcomers exactly that way:

"For anyone who wants a pitch to check out this show, this is the show that introduced people to Nathan Fielder's genius."

The empty chair it's filling

The reason a Canadian public-TV sketch is carrying this conversation is that the American institution built for it no longer exists. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert — the most-watched late-night show in the US and the loudest Trump commentary on network television — aired its final episode on May 22. CBS called the cancellation a financial decision; it came weeks after Paramount settled Trump's lawsuit, and the debate about that timing never fully died.

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Whatever the reason, the slot is empty, and the funniest available commentary on the American administration now uploads to YouTube from Halifax. American late night spent a decade worrying it would lose its audience to streaming and TikTok. On the evidence of this news cycle, it also lost its signature beat to the neighbors — a show taxpayer-funded by a country the administration keeps threatening with tariffs.

Previously we wrote: Saturday Night Live's David S. Pumpkins return: what Trump admitted in the middle of Tom Hanks's sketch