Jon Stewart is standing by his former Daily Show coworker Samantha Bee. Bee made headlines last week for referring to Ivanka Trump as a "feckless c---" on her show Full Frontal, criticizing the daughter of the president for posting a photo with her child while reports of undocumented children being separated from their parents were dominating headlines. The incident prompted outrage from the White House, resulting in an apology from the host. Stewart, however, dismissed the whole thing during an onstage Q&A at the Clusterfest comedy festival in San Francisco.
"They don’t give a shit about the word ‘c---,’" he said, according to The Daily Beast, referring to Trump's administration. "That is probably — he says that instead of ‘please,’ I’m guessing."
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He elaborated on what he says is a right-wing tactic to set rules they don't follow, trapping the left in an impossible situation.
"Please understand that a lot of what the right does, and it’s maybe their greatest genius, is they’ve created a code of conduct that they police, that they themselves don’t have to, in any way, abide," he explained, adding, "Don’t get caught in a trap of thinking you can live up to a code of integrity that will be enough for the propagandist right. There isn’t. And so, create your own moral code to live by, but don’t be fooled into trying to make concessions that you think will mollify them."
Despite this, Bee took to Twitter last week to apologize for the joke, calling it "inappropriate and inexcusable."
"I crossed a line, and I deeply regret it," she wrote.
I would like to sincerely apologize to Ivanka Trump and to my viewers for using an expletive on my show to describe her last night. It was inappropriate and inexcusable. I crossed a line, and I deeply regret it.
— Samantha Bee (@iamsambee) May 31, 2018