Stephen Colbert takes aim at Trump/Paramount settlement as a big fat bribe

A newly moustachioed Stephen Colbert returned from vacation on Monday night, catching up on the goings on at Paramount, The Late Show network CBS' parent company in July.

Namely, the $16 million settlement Paramount Global agreed with President Donald Trump, who filed a suit against the company in October for a 60 Minutes interview with former Vice-President Kamala Harris — Trump alleged "deceitful" editing ahead of the November presidential election.

"As someone who has alway been a proud employee of this network, I am offended," said Colbert in his Late Show monologue. "And I don't know if anything will ever repair my trust in this company. But just taking a stab at it, I'd say $16 million would help."

Colbert criticised Trump's "nuisance lawsuit" and Paramount's agreement saying, "Paramount knows they could have easily fought it because in their own words 'the lawsuit was completely without merit.' And keep in mind, Paramount produced Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, they know 'completely without merit.'"

Finishing up, Colbert brought out the big guns.

"I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles. It's big fat bribe," he said. "Because this all comes as Paramount's owners are trying to get Trump administration to approve the sale of our network to a new owner, Skydance. And some of the TV typers out there are blogging that once Skydance gets CBS, the new owner's desire to please Trump could 'put pressure on late night host and frequent Trump critic Stephen Colbert.'

"OK, but how are they going to put pressure on Stephen Colbert if they can't find him?"

Ahh, we get the moustache now.