Chris Rock told a crowd of Washington D.C. lawmakers that arresting former President Donald Trump was a “stupid” move, that surely will result in his popularity surging amongst supporters.
The comedian performed a politically-centric set at the Kennedy Center on Sunday night, where “Big Daddy” star Adam Sandler was being honored with the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, a lifetime achievement award for his contribution to comedy.
“Are you guys really going to arrest Trump?” Rock questioned a group of D.C. insiders, including Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
“Do you know this is only going to make him more popular?” He asked.
“It’s like arresting Tupac. He’s just gonna sell more records,” the “Grown Ups” star joked. “Are you stupid?”
Several of Sandler’s famous friends including Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Conan O’Brien, and Dana Carvey, roasted the honoree during the show, but Rock was fixated on politics.
He made a crack about Trump’s alleged dalliance with porn star Stormy Daniels, who is at the crux of Manhattan prosecutor Alvin Bragg’s case against the former president.
Trump’s looming indictment hinges on a $130,000 payment to his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, which could have violated campaign finance rules.
Rock described Trump’s 2016 reimbursement to Cohen, who cut the original check to Daniels, as a “romantic” gesture towards former first lady, Melania Trump.
He claimed that Trump had “f–ked a porn star and paid off someone so his wife couldn’t find out. That’s romantic.”
“We’ve all been cheated on,” Rock continued. “Don’t you wish that the person that cheated on you paid off somebody so you wouldn’t find out?”
Trump took to his social media platform on Sunday to lash out about his potentially pending indictment.
He railed at Bragg for “running the “Horseface” (his nickname for Daniels) Witch Hunt” against him, and insisted that the investigation was “Prosecutorial Misconduct and Interference with an Election.”
“There was no crime, period. All other of the many Democrat law enforcement officers that looked at it, took a pass,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
“So did Cy Vance, and so did Bragg. But then, much latter, he changed his mind. Gee, I wonder why?”
He said that Bragg was “breaking the law” by using the “fake and fully discredited testimony” of Cohen, a “convicted liar, felon, and jailbird” to “indict a former president” and current candidate “for a crime that doesn’t exist.”
“Alvin Bragg should be held accountable for the crime of ‘interference in a presidential election,” he concluded in all caps.
Rock took a parting shot at Trump, which also included jabs at President Joe Biden, who was not in attendance, and Paul Pelosi, who was in the audience.
“Trump was so bad as a president, he was so bad that Joe Biden had to burst off a monument. Biden was dead for 16 years,” he quipped.
“Paul Pelosi only got it. He knows how I felt,” Rock concluded.
The comedian hasn’t been shy about criticizing Trump, or Biden in the past. He took shots at both of them during the Season 46 premiere of “Saturday Night Live” in October 2020.
“President Trump’s in the hospital from COVID and you know, I just want to say my heart goes out to COVID,” he snarked.
Rock also suggested that Biden should be “the last president” the United States ever elects.
“I mean, what job do you have for four years no matter what?” he questioned.
“Show me one job. Like if you hired a cook and he was making people vomit every day, do you sit there and go, ‘Well, he’s got a four-year deal. We’ve just got to vomit for four more years.’”
“You realize there’s more rules to a game show than running for president? Like Donald Trump left a game show to run for president because it was easier,” Rock went on.
“You can’t just throw your son on Jeopardy, or your son-in-law. Steve Harvey can’t put his family on Family Feud.”
He also slammed the left for nominating the then aging candidate to take on Trump in the 2020 election.
“Do the Democrats even want to win? The Democrats just keep putting up 75-year-old people to run against Trump,” Rock scolded.
“One thing we can say about Trump, he’s got the most energy of any 75-year-old person on the face of the earth. Even Mick Jagger’s like, ‘Slow down, Donald.’”