Stay tuned!

Trump warns he’ll deliver a ‘message’ to Stephen Colbert ‘at a later date’ ahead of Late Show finale

Stay tuned!

By Derek Lawrence

Derek Lawrence

Derek Lawrence is a former associate editor at **. He left EW in 2022.

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May 21, 2026 5:00 p.m. ET

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Donald Trump at the White House; Stephen Colbert on 'The Late Show'. Credit:

Alex Wong/Getty; Scott Kowalchyk/CBS

- President Donald Trump said he will have a "message" for Stephen Colbert in the future.

- The final episode of *The Late Show With Stephen Colbert* is set to air Thursday night. - Trump and his administration were frequent targets of Colbert's comedy on the show.

Stephen Colbert officially has something to look forward to.

Ahead of the final episode of *The Late Show With Stephen Colbert* on Thursday night, President Donald Trump was asked if he had anything to say about the comedian, who was highly critical of Trump and his administration throughout the show's run.

Like the former TV host that he is, Trump teased that we'll have to stay tuned: "I'll have a message at a later date," he said, while addressing reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Wednesday.

Last summer, CBS announced the cancellation of the series, marking the end of *The Late Show*'s historic 33-year run.

"We consider Stephen Colbert irreplaceable and will retire *The Late Show *franchise at that time," the network said in a statement, adding that the move was "purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night."

Reports have suggested the network was losing upwards of $40 million a year on the production. Many skeptics, however, have pointed to Skydance Media's acquisition of Paramount Global, the parent company of CBS, as a cause, speculating that the new leadership wanted to stay out of Trump's crosshairs.

Former *Late Show* host David Letterman recently made headlines with his claim that Colbert was "dumped" so that he couldn't make any more "trouble" for CBS.

"I'm just going to go on record as saying: They're lying," Letterman declared. "Let me just add one other thing... They're lying weasels."

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'The Late Show With Stephen Colbert' will have an 'extended' finale — find out when it'll end

When the news broke last July that the *Late Show* was being canceled, the president denied his involvement.

"Everybody is saying that I was solely responsible for the firing of Stephen Colbert from CBS, Late Night. That is not true!" he wrote on Truth Social. "The reason he was fired was a pure lack of TALENT, and the fact that this deficiency was costing CBS $50 Million Dollars a year in losses — And it was only going to get WORSE!"

Even with Trump's vague threats, Colbert recently said he doesn't have "any fear" of the administration.

"I mean, how silly would it be," he told PEOPLE. "The ending of the show aside, which people can speculate about all they want, and I can't argue with their speculations, but we're clowns. How much does it diminish the office of the presidency to even notice what we say?"

Colbert's final, extended episode of *The Late Show *airs Thursday night at 11:35 p.m. ET/PT on CBS.

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