The Best Trump Burns at Conan O’Brien’s Kennedy Center Celebration

“In history for all time,” David Letterman said onstage at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, “this will have been the most entertaining gathering of the resistance, ever.” He was one of many starry openers in attendance as Conan O’Brien received the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. O’Brien’s ceremony, held Sunday night, was the most high-profile event at the venue since Donald Trump’s anti-woke takeover of the Kennedy Center began last month.

The president, who made himself chairman of the institution despite never having seen a show at the Kennedy Center, was a scorching topic at the comedy honors. “My thanks to the people who invited me here, several months ago: David Rubenstein and Deborah Rutter,” O’Brien said to rapturous applause, according to The New York Times. “I don’t know why they aren’t here tonight. I lost Wi-Fi in January. I’m guessing they’re in traffic.”

Rutter and Rubenstein, who announced O’Brien’s selection for the award shortly before Trump’s inauguration, were ousted from the center’s once bipartisan board by Trump. They were replaced by the likes of second lady Usha Vance, who was booed alongside her husband, VP JD Vance, while attending a symphony at the venue earlier this month, as well as Trump chief of staff Susie Wiles, Attorney General Pam Bondi, plus Fox News hosts Laura Ingraham and Maria Bartiromo. Trump’s overhaul has led many in Hollywood, including power players like Issa Rae, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Shonda Rhimes, to distance themselves from the institution.

But a slew of celebrities entered the building to praise O’Brien—and skewer its modern overlord. John Mulaney joked that the Kennedy Center would soon be renamed “The Roy Cohn Pavilion for Big Strong Men Who Love Cats.” Stephen Colbert declared that two modern members were joining the board: “Bashar al-Assad [the ousted president of Syria] and Skeletor.” Will Ferrell quipped that he had no time to be at the ceremony because he was “supposed to be shutting down the Department of Education.”

As reported by CBS News, fellow presenter Sarah Silverman “made multiple Trump jokes that were too vulgar to print.” The Hill went ahead and published one of them, where she said to O’Brien, “I really miss the days when you were America’s only orange a–hole.”

Speaking via video, Martin Short said, “There is no more fitting recipient getting the last-ever Twain Prize here at the Robert F. Kennedy Center,” replacing the 35th president’s name with that of his nephew, Trump’s current Health and Human Services Secretary.

But for all the humor about this being the last Twain Prize, O’Brien largely avoided the topic of politics, as he did while hosting the 2025 Oscars earlier this month. Before the broadcast he told The New York Times that “however anyone voted should not be a prerequisite for whether you enjoy the show.” That didn’t stop O’Brien from making this joke about best picture winner Anora—“I guess Americans are excited to see somebody finally stand up to a powerful Russian,” or being asked to return as Oscars 2026 host.

During his acceptance of the Mark Twain Prize, O’Brien invoked the honor’s namesake. “First and foremost, Twain hated bullies,” he began, according to The Hill. “He punched up, not down, and he deeply, deeply empathized with the weak. Twain was suspicious of populism, jingoism, imperialism, the money-obsessed mania of the Gilded Age, and any expression of mindless American might or self-importance,” O’Brien continued, “Above all, Twain was a patriot in the best sense of the word. He loved America, but knew it was deeply flawed. Twain wrote, ‘Patriotism is supporting your country all of the time, and your government when it deserves it.’”

After his remarks, O’Brien was joined by a band of dancing Twain impersonators, where he picked up the guitar to play a song alongside Adam Sandler: Neil Young’s 1989 hit, “Rockin’ in the Free World.” The ceremony will premiere on Sunday, May 4, exclusively on Netflix.