On Sunday night, John Oliver opened the latest edition of his Emmy-winning series by addressing Donald Trump's controversial airplane switcheroo incident while leaving a NATO summit in Turkey[reference:132]. Trump's plane was secretly swapped out on his return trip due to intelligence regarding a possible Iranian attempt on his Qatari-gifted Air Force One plane[reference:133]. Trump reportedly snuck off the plane and onto a catering truck that whisked him to a smaller military jet for the return flight[reference:134].
Oliver's Commentary
Oliver cracked, "The only problem I can see there is: Next time he needs to escape, he's not going to be able to use the catering truck trick again because everyone knows about it now. People are going to be suspicious from now on if they see a plane go one way, a catering truck go another and an enormous man-sized cake get wheeled away by two suspiciously-jacked chefs"[reference:135].
Staff Left Behind
Oliver continued, "While it clearly doesn't look great for a president to be emergency-hiding in a catering truck, it looks even worse when you remember that a lot of other people were still on that plane that he was smuggled off of"[reference:136]. A number of journalists and White House staffers, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, were left onboard Air Force One after Trump escaped[reference:137].
"Not great!" exclaimed Oliver. "There were a lot of innocent people on that plane—and Marco Rubio"[reference:138]. Coincidentally—or not—Trump's White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced her resignation shortly after the incident[reference:139].