“He is desperately looking for a scapegoat” – Stephen Colbert BREAKS SILENCE after LATE SHOW cancellation, calls out a SCAPEGOAT HUNT and sparks fears he’s about to burn it all down before the lights go off for good

Stephen Colbert isn’t retreating quietly. Just days after word leaked that The Late Show would be pulled from CBS in 2026, Colbert stunned viewers with a sharp on-air jab that seemed to confirm growing tensions behind the curtain. “Somebody is desperately looking for a scapegoat,” he said, eyes narrowing, smile gone. Sources say this wasn’t just a throwaway comment—it was a warning. With only months left before the curtain falls, insiders fear Colbert could expose what really happened to kill the show.

Is CBS ready for what Colbert might reveal next? Find out what he said when the cameras stopped rolling…

You can’t keep a good man — or his popular late-night monologue — down.

After CBS announced on Thursday that The Late Show With Stephen Colbert has been canceled and will end next May, some viewers may assume the talk show’s host, Stephen Colbert, will be more subdued about politics in upcoming episodes. Many have questioned the timing of the announcement given that Colbert recently criticized CBS’ corporate parent, Paramount Global, for settling a suit filed by President Donald Trump that some legal observers think should have been dismissed on First Amendment grounds.

But Colbert, 61, insists he is not backing down on his criticism of the sitting President.

During Thursday night’s episode, the host roasted Trump for several recent announcements, quipping that clearly the former host of The Apprentice would “rather have us talk about his hand than Jeffrey Epstein.”

Trump has drawn ire from across the political aisle for reversing his campaign position on exposing the client list of the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender, whose 2019 death in jail was ruled a suicide.

“That controversy is causing so much trouble for Trump that he recently ordered it to be put in a cell and for the cameras to stop working for three minutes,” Colbert said during his monologue, referencing reports that the prison video showing Epstein’s cell the night of his death was tampered with.

Colbert continued, “Here’s where things stand: MAGA is furious because they think Trump is refusing to release the Epstein files. In response, Trump has been saying that there are no credible files. And if there are, they’re really boring. And also, Obama made them up.”

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The Emmy winner accused Trump of “desperately looking for a scapegoat,” which Colbert joked would explain why he fired Maurene Comey, the Manhattan federal prosecutor who worked on the cases against Epstein as well as his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell and hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs.

“[Trump] pulled the UNO reverse card, calling on the FBI to investigate this Jeffrey Epstein hoax, by which he evidently means he wants the FBI to investigate the folks who investigated Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking, which is weird,” Colbert said.

Colbert also addressed Trump saying he wanted to fire Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell, whom he appointed in 2017, despite his claim that former Preside Joe Biden appointed Powell into office.

“Even the whiff of it roiled the stock market yesterday,” Colbert said. “That’s because firing the Fed chair, who was supposed to be an independent steward of our financial system and our monetary policy, would create an issue that economists call [explosion noises]. One economist likened the idea of firing Powell to ripping the fabric of the universe.”

But, as Colbert added, “Wall Street’s message of abject panic must have gotten through to Trump because just a few hours after floating the idea, he told reporters that he was highly unlikely to fire the Fed chair, but made it clear he’s no fan.”

The announcement of The Late Show‘s cancellation, which will end the franchise after it has aired for 33 years, provoked backlash from famous faces and fans alike.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren — who has been candid about her disapproval over Paramount settling the lawsuit brought by Trump over a 2024 60 Minutes interview with his contender in that year’s presidential election, Kamala Harris — is among the move’s most vocal detractors.

“CBS canceled Colbert’s show just THREE DAYS after Colbert called out CBS parent company Paramount for its $16M settlement with Trump — a deal that looks like bribery,” the Massachusetts senator wrote on X on Thursday. “America deserves to know if his show was canceled for political reasons. Watch and share his message.”

Though CBS labeled Trump’s suit “completely without merit” and asked a judge to dismiss it, the network eventually conceded, a decision that many decried in light of Paramount’s effort to merge with Skydance Media, which would require the approval of the Trump administration.

Pushing further speculation about why The Late Show has been axed is Trump’s reaction to the news.

“I absolutely love that Colbert got fired. His talent was even less than his ratings,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on Friday morning. “I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next. Has even less talent than Colbert!”

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The president then praised Fox News late-night comedian Greg Gutfeld, who Trump wrote “is better than all of them combined, including the moron on NBC who ruined the once great Tonight Show,” referring to Jimmy Fallon.

Watch Colbert’s full monologue from Thursday night’s episode of The Late Show above.