Trump wanted ‘SNL’ cancelled for making fun of him. That’s dictator business.

Trump wanted ‘SNL’ cancelled for making fun of him. That’s dictator business.

Before Donald Trump launched his war on our democracy, there was his very public war on comedy — or at least on those who dared to mock his self-inflated sense of majesty. Now new reporting shows that while in the White House, Trump wanted to use his power as president to shut down “Saturday Night Live.”

I can hear it now: “Live from New York, it's your show canceled for mocking Donald Trump!” (Cut to the audience in stunned silence — except for a few Trump fans who applaud wildly.) And having seen up close the way authoritarians crack down on comedy and satire, I absolutely believe that Trump would've turned off the lights in NBC's famed Studio 8H forever if given the chance.

The new report fits a pattern from the pathetically thin-skinned Trump, who has spent years publicly lashing out at TV shows and comedians who ridicule him — from calling for "SNL" to be canceled in the closing days of the 2016 campaign to taking time in the middle of a 2018 campaign rally to slam the late night hosts Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmell.