Ladies and gentlemen, everybody out there watching, welcome one and all to The Late Show.

I'm your host, Stephen Colbert.

It has been, it has been, it has been an eventful week and it's only Tuesday, but you know what?

Hang in there, baby, because the weekend's coming and it's a big holiday weekend, Flag Day.

Holiday we all definitely celebrate every year.

Drinking Flag Nog, kissing under the flaggle toe, hoping we get Flagmas presents when old St. Betsy Ross slides down the pole.

This Saturday, in honor of Flag Day and at the request of President Trump,

Washington, D.C. will host a big military parade featuring 7,500 soldiers, 28 Abrams tanks, 50 military helicopters, 28 striker armored vehicles, a display of rocket launchers and missiles, plus 34 horses, two mules and a dog.

Okay, this is dictator stuff.

An unprecedented peacetime display of military hardware on American soil and all I can say is, not enough mules.

Two, two mules, that's it for my tax dollars.

I mean, what are you thinking?

You bring your whole family down to the parade?

How do you explain to your kids they already missed the mules?

That's what everyone, people come for the mules.

For the record, the dog in there is named Doc Holiday and he is a member of the 1st Cavalry Division where he's used to help motivate the mules.

Oh my God, oh my God, these snowflake Gen Z mules.

I need my dog at work to motivate me.

Less talking, more muling.

Officially, this is meant to be a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the US Army, but would you look at that?

The parade just happens to be taking place on Trump's 79th birthday.

Wow, a military parade in Washington and that's just for his 79th.

For his 80th, he's gonna make the whole army go on a girl's trip to Nashville.

But Trump swears, swears, this isn't about him.

We're celebrating the Army on Flag Day and it's not my birthday, it is my birthday, but I'm not celebrating my birthday,

I'm celebrating Flag Day.

It happens to be the same day, so I take a little heat, but Flag Day is the appropriate date.

I know how he feels, you know?

I was born on May 13th and every year I have to remind people that the massive party and all the gifts are not for me, they're for International Hummus Day.

Hummus, not me, hummus.

Hummus wanted the electric motorbike from Can-Am Motorbikes that could be sent straight to the Ed Sullivan Theater and hummus's wife would never know.

So, if you're keeping track, if you're keeping track, the running tally of reasons for Trump's big boom boom parade are Flag Day, 250th Army anniversary, and also for some reason, winning World War II 80 years ago.

We're the only country that didn't celebrate their victory and we're the one that won the war, okay?

If it wasn't for us, that war, you would be speaking German right now, okay?

We won the war and you might be speaking Japanese too.

I mean, you might be speaking a combination of both.

Yes.

No, it's so true, it's so true, a combination.

You'd be speaking Deutschpanese, you would.

You'd all be saying, you'd all be saying,

Domo arigato, Mr. Lederhosen, for folding my schnitzel into a beautiful origami crane.

That's what you'd be saying.

That's not me, that's history.

Oh, actually, according to the Secretary of the Army, there's another reason for the parade.

It's to offer a chance to tell the public about the Army.

Well, thank goodness, because without this parade, the American people would have no awareness of any of our military branches, unless they watch before a football game, during a football game, the football game post-show, or if they live in Los Angeles, California.

Because this, this is day four, day four of Donald Trump's war on anyone who didn't vote for him.

We taped this at about six o'clock, so I don't know for a full-blown civil war yet, but if, just in case our country has split into two opposing forces, I call shirts.

Now, as we speak,

Trump has sent thousands of troops into downtown LA to quell what historians will remember as the battle of that video of a burning Waymo car they kept showing on cable news.

Now, there has been some rock throwing by protesters at ICE vehicles, but MAGA Twitter has reported many more shocking incidents, like this video, which claimed to show protesters firing from the ground at a National Guard jet.

Only one problem, the footage from a video game called Arma 3.

Wow.

Okay, they also, they also posted disturbing footage of an Italian immigrant running around murdering turtles.

Wow.

Authorities.

Wow.

Yeah.

Just rockin'.

Boop, boop, boop, boop.

Authorities also warn he could be high on mushrooms.

So how do we get here?

Well, remember how Trump promised to round up all the violent gang members and Hannibal Lectors roaming our streets like during the campaign?

Turns out there aren't that many of them.

And Stephen Miller wants to report much more than one million undocumented immigrants per year.

So, a few weeks back, he screamed at ICE agents, what do you mean you're going after criminals?

Why aren't you at Home Depot?

Why aren't you at 7-Eleven?

That's right.

Those 7-Eleven workers are dangerous because they have access to biological weapons like the roller hot dog.

That's, can't be good.

That is just a fly merry-go-round is what that is.

Then, following Stephen Miller's orders,

ICE went to Los Angeles and started just rounding up people at workplaces, which of course led to protests that the mayor described as 100 people, 27 people were arrested.

Soon after, without agreement from state leaders,

Trump called in the National Guard.

Well, no surprise there.

I mean, Trump's just getting revenge on Tinseltown.

He never won an Emmy for The Apprentice and he was snubbed, he was snubbed in the 1993 Oscars for his performance in Home Alone 2.

Yep, they gave it to Pacino for scent of a woman, okay?

A woman, I've smelled thousands of women and I'm not even blind, okay?

Hoo-ah, hoo-ah, hoo-ah, hoo-ah, nee-ah.

Okay, so that's the National Guard, right?

So that's the National Guard.

California didn't ask for them, but those are the troops you send in to help with the crisis within the United States.

No, you don't call active duty Marines, but yesterday on Pete Hegseth's orders, the Pentagon deployed 700 Marines to Los Angeles.

Marines are not supposed to use force against civilians in the U.S.

because the Constitution says don't do that.

Plus, it's not easy to deploy to Los Angeles.

And why is that, Colonel Jessup?

You can't handle the traffic.

Because, because this is unprecedented, there are no clear rules of engagement.

So each Marine will receive a card explaining what they can and cannot do.

That could end up being confusing.

All right, stay where you are, protester.

Let's see, my card says, my card says, hold on, it's right there.

4147620438734223 when expiration 928, security code 664, oh wait, no, don't use that.

Don't use that.

Yes.

I gotta call Capital One and cancel that now.

There's nothing to worry about.

Okay, there's no way this is gonna get out of hand because according to the military, these Marines have been trained in de-escalation, which sounds nice at first, but you'll recall this entire mess started with a tragic de-escalation.

Yesterday, was this yesterday?

At a business round table,

Trump talked about the situation in Los Angeles.

Thank goodness we sent out some wonderful National Guard.

They've really helped.

We sent out the troops and they've done a fantastic job.

That is some low energy fascism right there.

Next, we're going to, next we're gonna, we're gonna round up, we're gonna round up journalists, journalists, I guess, and we're gonna grind them up and feed them to my, to my birthday mules, I mean,

I mean, my flag mules, my flag mules.

We've got a great show for you tonight.

My guests are Nicole Wallace, Sidney Lauper, and when we come back, basketball, basketball.

Thank you.