Larry Wilmore mocks Emory University’s Donald Trump protest

Larry Wilmore mocked Emory University students who said they felt threatened by ‘Trump 2016’ graffiti on campus

The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore skewered Emory University students who said they were traumatized by chalk drawings supporting Donald Trump that appeared on campus during Thursday night’s episode of the Comedy Central series in a segment titled “Babies on Campus.”

Host Larry Wilmore began by pointing out that there have been legitimate cases of hate crimes and intimidation on college campuses, including an incident at Connecticut College just last year where someone wrote the phrase “No n***ers” in a campus bathroom, which the comedian joked was NBC’s original title for Friends.

Wilmore then threw to a clip from Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor where an Emory student stated that some of his peers felt the pro-Trump chalk writings in question were “a violent action against them.”

“Traumatized? Just by seeing his name in chalk?” Wilmore questioned. “That’s nothing. How do you think I feel living in New York? I got to see that s**t in in gold every day. That’s a hate crime.”

Another clip reported that Emory University was vowing to hunt down the people responsible for writing ‘Trump 2016’ on a sidewalk in chalk, and the school was now offering emergency counseling.

Wilmore then introduced two students enrolled at the university, played by Nightly Show contributors Robin Theade and Jordan Carlos. “I had no idea I went to school with people who had different opinions than me,” Theade exclaimed. “It is terrifying.” Carlos agreed, arguing that he was generally an open-minded individual who’s open to hearing any idea on the political spectrum “from liberal all the way to progressive.”

The pair squealed at the mere mention of the word “Trump,” saying it was their “trigger word,” and labeling it as hate speech. “See, this is what I mean. This feels like an overreaction,” Wilmore continued. “…Why is writing his name in chalk tantamount to an assault?” The students argued that it’s because it was written in all caps using white chalk in what they thought was a “safe space.”

But Wilmore wasn’t convinced. He added, “Guys, trust me,  you’re blowing this whole thing out of proportion. You need to stop being so sensitive.” After being accused of being a “far right-wing radical,” the comedian wondered whether the timing of the protest was a way of getting out of taking their mid-terms. The Emory students then excused themselves to attend a protest in response to someone seeing the word “slave” in a history book. Watch the whole segment below:

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Wilmore continued to discuss the subject during the show’s panel, with Carlos wondering why the students didn’t get creative by adding a word in front of Trump, while fellow Nightly Show contributor Mike Yard questioned why they didn’t simply erase the words since it was only written in chalk.

This is arguably one of the few times a late-night show has openly mocked a group on the liberal end of the spectrum, though the topic of college campuses becoming too PC and limiting free speech is often discussed by Bill Maher. Unsurprisingly, the comedian brought up the incident at Emory during Friday’s episode of his HBO show Real Time, angrily admitting that he wanted to dropkick the offended students into a place where there’s actual pain and suffering.

The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore airs weeknights at 11:30 p.m. on Comedy Central.