Jimmy Fallon Slammed for Not Attacking President Trump: ‘Banal Nightmare’

Jimmy Fallon is under fire for deliberately dodging any real criticism of President Donald Trump in a new opinion essay, which also argues that his relentless niceness is doing more cultural damage than viewers realize.

The blistering takedown, published in the March/April 2026 print edition of Current Affairs, cultural critic Jon Greenaway holds nothing back, labeling Fallon’s entire approach to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon a “banal nightmare” and calling out what the publication describes as a systematic avoidance of political accountability.

According to the essay, Fallon, 51, doesn’t engage with politics, and when pressed, his position is that he wants to “keep his head down” because “we hit both sides equally.” Greenaway argues that Fallon’s kind of forced neutrality is a deliberate choice that carries real ethical consequences.

The sharpest example cited in the Current Affairs piece dates back to September 2016, when Fallon hosted then-candidate Trump, 79, on his show. Rather than challenge or even satirize the polarizing political figure, Fallon performed a lighthearted skit that ended with him playfully mussing Trump’s hair. Per the essay, the moment was “the ultimate, logical end point of the show’s ideological structure.”

According to the piece, Trump, who has a reputation for criticizing late night shows, recognizes “there’s nothing about Fallon’s empty banality that could be anything close to a threat.”

The Current Affairs essay arrives at a particularly turbulent time for late night television. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert will air its final episode on Thursday, May 21, as the National Enquirer has previously reported.

Meanwhile, Jimmy Kimmel Live! was suspended by ABC and its parent company Disney for six days in September 2025 after Jimmy Kimmel, 58, made comments about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk that drew backlash from the Trump administration. Kimmel returned to air and has continued to be a target of the president, with Trump calling for his firing again in April 2026 after the host made a joke about first lady Melania Trump.

And yet, amid all of the late-night upheaval, Fallon has carried on without consequence. The essay argues that’s by design, as The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon exists to sand down every sharp edge into harmless, shareable content. Greenaway cites comedian Bo Burnham‘s take in a 2016 standup set: “People we’ve seen too much of, mouthing along to songs we’ve heard too much of.”

As Enquirer reported, a source says Fallon is prepping Call Her Daddy host Alex Cooper to be his late-night successor.