A day after Daily Show correspondent Jaboukie Young-White offered his thoughts on the unfolding story about how Empire actor Jussie Smollett allegedly planned a fake hate crime against himself, host Trevor Noah recapped some of the newer emerging details during Thursday night’s show. One of the strangest details of the case is that Smollett wrote his two “attackers†checks for their work. “What, did he also write ‘fake hate crime’ in the memo? Even amateurs know if you commit a crime, you go all cash, people. No paper trail!†Noah said. “You’ve never seen a movie where the bad guys are like, ‘I need you to get rid of someone for me. Now who do I make this check out to?’â€
Another detail from the story is that Smollett had planned out the attack so it would all be caught on a surveillance camera — but it turns out that the camera was facing another direction during the allegedly staged incident. “You’ve got to be shitting me,†Noah said. “He wanted to be caught, but he didn’t get caught on camera because he didn’t know which way the camera was pointing? You’re an actor — that’s your only job!â€
While Noah points out that there are many Democratic politicians who are now awkwardly walking back their initial statements about the attack (Kamala Harris had called it a “modern-day lynchingâ€), there’s actually some light at the end of this very dark and confusing tunnel. “When this started out, it was a story about people who hated Jussie Smollett because he was black and gay. But now people hate him because he’s an asshole,†he said. “In other words, they’re judging him on the content of his character and not the color of his skin. And that, my friends, is progress.â€