Stephen Colbert Responds to Calls To Fire Him #FireColbert

Stephen Colbert‘s homophobic joke about Trump and Putin provoked alt-righters and conservatives to call for his removal from the show, arguing that it was homophobic.

On Wednesday’s show, Stephen Colbert acknowledged the furor he caused on Monday when he said Trump’s mouth was only good for being Vladimir Putin’s “c**k holster.”

“Welcome to The Late Show. I’m your host, Stephen Colbert. Still? Am I still the host? I’m still the host!” he said, according to a transcript provided to CNN. “Now, if you saw my monologue Monday, you know that I was a little upset at Donald Trump for insulting a friend of mine.”

Colbert said in hindsight he would have changed “a few words that were cruder than they needed to be,” but he didn’t take back anything.

“So at the end of that monologue I had a few choice insults for the president in return. I don’t regret that. He, I believe, can take care of himself. I have jokes; he has the launch codes. So, it’s a fair fight,” he added.

“I’m not going to repeat the phrase, but I just want to say for the record, life is short, and anyone who expresses their love for another person, in their own way, is to me, an American hero. I think we can all agree on that. I hope even the president and I can agree on that.

“Nothing else…But, that.”