John Oliver Takes Aim at Musk and Stevens Over Midterms
John Oliver used the Sunday edition of his HBO show, Last Week Tonight, to go after two figures from the 2026 midterm elections: Elon Musk and Haley Stevens.
Last Week Tonight is a weekly comedy news programme, and Oliver's segment on the results ran on November 8, 2026. Variety reported on the segment the same day, describing it as Oliver calling out the midterm "losers."
On Musk, Oliver said the tech entrepreneur wasted the nearly $500 million he spent during the 2026 election cycle in an attempt to buy the result. Oliver also pointed to $200 million Musk spent trying to defeat Senator-elect James Talarico in Texas. Talarico won. Oliver also said Musk is ending production of Cybertrucks, the electric pickup truck made by Musk's company Tesla.
On Stevens, a Democrat, Oliver said she had damaged her own political career for nothing. Stevens had backed Republican Mike Rogers in the Michigan race, which was won by Abdul El-Sayed. Oliver's remarks were aimed at that choice.
Musk and Stevens had not, in the material available for this piece, responded to the segment.
Oliver's show has a long record at the Emmy Awards. HBO says Last Week Tonight with John Oliver has won 32 Emmys. The show is made by a team that includes Oliver, Tim Carvell, Liz Stanton, Jon Thoday and James Taylor as executive producers.
For viewers, the segment is a reminder that the midterms produced high-profile personal stakes. For the people who run the show, it is one more week of a long-running programme taking on the news, one segment at a time.
