ARLINGTON — “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” aired its final episode on May 21, 2026. CBS had announced the show’s cancellation the previous summer, citing financial issues—a rationale Stephen Colbert frequently denied.

Longtime reporter Bill Carter claimed President Donald Trump was personally involved in having the show canceled, based on Trump’s response to the series finale. Carter was referring to an AI-generated video posted on Trump’s official X account that showed Trump grabbing Colbert during his show and throwing him into a large dumpster, followed by Trump dancing to the Village People’s “Y.M.C.A.”

“It’s not a good development for the country, obviously. Certainly the idea that he throws a man in the dumpster at the end of it indicates that he was personally involved,” Carter said in a podcast interview.

Carter further alleged that the government sought to remove Colbert because of his criticism of Trump. “The government was pushing to get rid of this man because he was a critic. And, you know, that is so alien to our values that I think most Americans — even people who are kind of neutral about it, maybe not his strong supporters — know this is not something we do. We don’t do that. We don’t shut people up because they criticize us. And I think everybody who has a sense of that realizes this was a bad situation that we are going to have to deal with on an ongoing basis,” he said.

Carter also criticized CBS for its handling of legal pressure from Trump. He said in a separate podcast interview that when CBS capitulated in the lawsuit Trump filed against a news program, it signaled the network was no longer committed to independent journalism. He added that by canceling Colbert and eliminating the time slot entirely, CBS effectively abandoned its role in late-night political satire.

Colbert frequently targeted Trump in the final years of his show. According to a study from the Media Research Center, Colbert made 3,639 jokes about President Donald Trump between January 3, 2023, and the show’s end. It was reported that “The Late Show” was losing the network $40 million per year.