NEW YORK | Did you hear that joke about President Trump? Or, more precisely, did you hear all 3,128 jokes?

A think tank that has analyzed the content of late-night comedy for the past 26 years said Donald Trump was the butt of more jokes in 2017 than any other celebrity or public figure has for a single calendar year. And it isn’t even close.

He eclipsed the previous record of 1,816, set by Trump as a presidential candidate in 2016, said the Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University in a study released Friday. Prior to that, the record was 1,717 by former President Bill Clinton in 1998, the year of the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

This Nov. 6, 2018 photo released by CBS shows host Stephen Colbert on the set of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” in New York. A think tank that has studied the content of late-night comedy for the past 26 years says Trump was the butt of more jokes in 2017 than any other public figure has for a single year. By a lot. The Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University, which released a study on Friday, said the record-holder before that was President Clinton in 1998, the year of Monica Lewinsky. (Scott Kowalchyk/CBS via AP)
This Nov. 6, 2018 photo released by CBS shows host Stephen Colbert on the set of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” in New York. A think tank that has studied the content of late-night comedy for the past 26 years says Trump was the butt of more jokes in 2017 than any other public figure has for a single year. By a lot. The Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University, which released a study on Friday, said the record-holder before that was President Clinton in 1998, the year of Monica Lewinsky. (Scott Kowalchyk/CBS via AP)

“Trump makes Bill Clinton look like a piker when it comes to political humor,” said Robert Lichter, head of the center. The study looked at opening monologue jokes on shows hosted by Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel and Trevor Noah last year.

There were 6,337 political jokes in the show’s monologues last year, and Trump was the subject of nearly half of them.

Presidential humor has always been a mainstay in late-night comedy, but hosts would often make a couple of jokes about the president and then quickly move on to other news stories, said Bill Carter, author of “The Late Shift” about the television comedy shows. That has changed, he said.

“Rarely is there another news story that provides fodder enough for the writers,” Carter said. “The writers seem to be consumed, as the nation is consumed, as the news media is consumed. There’s an endless and bottomless supply.”

Colbert has vaulted to the top of the late-night ratings with a Trump-centric approach, and his talk show rivals have taken notice.

Trump’s administration has left many in the country in a state of high anxiety, and comedy provides an outlet, Carter said.

Carter used to think that viewers would get tired of all the Trump jokes, but now he isn’t that sure.

“If Colbert came out and didn’t do a monologue about Trump, you’d say, ‘What happened?’” he said.

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