‘Fighting for scraps’: Trump shares quote knocking late-night talk show hosts

President Trump’s focus on late-night talk show hosts stretched into a second day on Thursday, when he shared a quote lauding the late NBC “Tonight Show” host Johnny Carson and declaring Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon will be unemployed after he finishes a second term.

“The three very weak and untalented late night ‘hosts’ are ‘fighting over table scraps. Carson did a great job, it wasn’t political. I don’t know what they’re going to do in 2024 when he’s no longer President? Will be wacky in the unemployment line,’ ” Trump tweeted to his more than 59 million followers after comic Michael Loftus appeared on Fox News’s morning program “Fox & Friends.”

The three very weak and untalented late night “hosts” are “fighting over table scraps. Carson did a great job, it wasn’t political. I don’t know what they’re going to do in 2024 when he’s no longer President? Will be wacky in the unemployment line.” Michael Loftus @foxandfriends

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 14, 2019

The tweet comes one day after the president weighed in on a “Fox & Friends” discussion of former “Tonight Show” host Jay Leno, who said late-night shows are now too political and lack “civility.” 

“The one-sided hatred on these shows is incredible and for me, unwatchable,” Trump tweeted on Wednesday. “But remember, WE are number one — President!”

Leno, 68, initially left “The Tonight Show” in 2009 but returned in 2010 after the show experienced a tumultuous run with host Conan O’Brien.

He left again in February 2014, while still leading his competition on CBS and ABC in the late-night ratings race, and was replaced by Fallon, a former “Saturday Night Live” cast member.

Fallon initially beat CBS’s Colbert and ABC’s Kimmel in the late-night ratings race, but once Trump declared his candidacy in June 2015, late-night shows became dominated by political news and opinion.

As a result, Colbert, a frequent critic of Trump who formerly hosted the political satire show “The Colbert Report” on Comedy Central, eventually jumped ahead of Fallon.

Trump often lashes out at the late-night programs.

At a campaign rally last June, he mocked each late-night host and questioned their humor before insisting that he “can laugh at myself.”

Trump also has a long-running feud with “Saturday Night Live,” which frequently targets the president in its sketches and has brought on Alec Baldwin to do regular impersonations.

Updated at 9:14 a.m.