Late-night hosts talk Donald Trump’s baseless claims that Tylenol causes autism, and Jimmy Kimmel returns to air with an emotional monologue.

Stephen Colbert

Stephen Colbert opened Tuesday’s monologue by thanking everybody in the studio and viewers at home, “who I think might just be my wife, Evie, because everybody else is probably watching ABC”, as Jimmy Kimmel returned to the airwaves after a nearly weeklong suspension that sparked a national outcry over free speech.

“I’m glad Kimmel’s back,” the Late Show host continued. “He’s a wonderful fella. To know him well is to admire him immensely, even if he takes the whole summer off.”

Colbert then pivoted to Trump’s “insane” press conference in which he blamed Tylenol for autism. “OK, autism is a simple term that actually covers a variety of developmental differences across the spectrum,” Colbert explained. “And you can’t blame anyone, even Donald Trump, for seeking answers. But experts in the field caution that what President Trump said in his speech yesterday was – and I don’t want to get bogged down in technical jargon here – fucking crazy.”

“Now listen, I’m not a doctor,” he continued. “But you know who is? Republican Senator Bill Cassidy,” who posted on X about the Tylenol claims: “The preponderance of evidence shows that this is not the case.”

“Uh oh, I think Bill Cassidy just lost his late-night talkshow,” Colbert joked.

Trump’s claim appears to be based on one paper that found some correlation between acetaminophen and offspring diagnosed with autism, but even that one study’s author cautioned that “correlation is not causation”.

“Exactly,” Colbert said. “For example, I picked a side salad over fries the day my show got cancelled. Is that why? Probably not, but just to be safe, I will never eat a salad again.”

Jimmy Kimmel

“I’m not sure who had a weirder 48 hours, me or the CEO of Tylenol,” said Jimmy Kimmel on Tuesday evening, in his first monologue since Disney, which owns ABC, suspended his late-night show from the network last week under pressure from Trump officials over his comments on the shooting of rightwing activist Charlie Kirk.

“This show is not important,” he said. “What is important is that we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this.”

Kimmel thanked his viewers, fellow hosts and supporters. “And maybe most of all I want to thank the people who don’t support my show and what I believe, but support my right to share those beliefs anyway,” he added.

“I do want to make something clear, because it’s important to me as a human, and that is you understand that it was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” he continued, fighting back tears. “I don’t think there’s anything funny about it.”

“Nor was it my intention to blame any specific group for the actions of what – it was obviously a deeply disturbed individual,” he added. “That was really the opposite of the point I was trying to make, but I understand that to some that felt either ill-timed or unclear, or maybe both. And for those who think I did point a finger, I get why you’re upset. If the situation was reversed, there’s a good chance I’d have felt the same way.”

Later in the monologue, Kimmel criticized Trump, saying that the president “did his best to cancel me” but that “instead, he forced millions of people to watch the show”.

“The president of the United States made it very clear he wants to see me and the hundreds of people who work here fired from our jobs,” he added. “Our leader celebrates Americans losing their livelihoods because he can’t take a joke.”

Kimmel concluded with “one thing I did learn from Lenny Bruce and George Carlin and Howard Stern”, which is that “a government threat to silence a comedian the president doesn’t like is anti-American”.

Seth Meyers

And on Late Night, Seth Meyers recalled Trump’s comment during a press conference last week that he thought the war in Ukraine would be easier to resolve, and that Vladimir Putin had “really let me down”.

“Yeah, you know, you think you know a guy and then it turns out you’re the only one who doesn’t,” Meyers quipped.

While addressing the North Korean parliament on Monday, leader Kim Jong-un said that he had “good memories” of Trump. “I mean, sure, we all do,” said Meyers. “For example, remember when he looked directly at an eclipse? That’s a great memory.”

In other news, a Malibu mansion previously owned by late talkshow host Johnny Carson was recently listed for $110m. The house boasts multiple swimming pools and a private tennis pavilion that was a gift from NBC. “While NBC gave me a free trial of Peacock Premium – with ads,” said Meyers.

And law enforcement officials recently discovered a human skull and bones in a traveler’s luggage at a Florida airport, “but since it’s Florida, they just made him check it”, Meyers joked.