On July 18, 2025, the television network CBS announced that The Late Show with Stephen Colbert will conclude once the upcoming broadcasting season is completed. The talk show will air until May 2026, and there will be no other entity replacing Colbert as the host, bringing the late-night franchise to an end.According to TV Insider's July 15, 2025, report on late-night show ratings, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ranked first in the 11:35 p.m. hour with an average viewership of 2.417 million across 41 new episodes. The report mentioned that Colbert's show was the only one to scale an increase over the first quarter by 1%. Additionally, the show garnered 219,000 viewers in the 18-49 age demographic. View this post on Instagram Instagram PostDavid Stapf, the president of CBS Studios, Amy Reisenbach, the president of CBS Entertainment, and George Cheeks, president and CEO of CBS and co-CEO of Paramount Global, put forth a joint statement, mentioning:“We consider Stephen Colbert irreplaceable and will retire The Late Show franchise at that time. We are proud that Stephen called CBS home. He and the broadcast will be remembered in the pantheon of greats that graced late-night television."The statement mentioned that the cancellation of Colbert's show was "purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night". It added that the cancellation doesn't concern the show's "performance, content, or other matters happening at Paramount."What did Stephen Colbert say about Paramount? Details explored as his late-night show gets cancelledThe news of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert getting cancelled comes days after the talk show host poked fun at his network's parent company, Paramount. On July 14, 2025, Stephen Colbert took a dig at Paramount for settling a lawsuit with President Donald Trump.For the unversed, the network agreed to pay Trump $16 million to settle a legal dispute concerning an interview it broadcast with former Vice-President Kamala Harris on its '60 Minutes' segment on CBS.As per BBC's report dated July 2, 2025, Trump filed a lawsuit in October 2024 claiming that Paramount had falsely edited the '60 Minutes' interview to "tip the scales in favour of the Democratic party". While Paramount agreed to settle the lawsuit, the money was allocated to Donald Trump's future presidential library and wasn't paid to him directly or indirectly.Taking a dig at the situation, Stephen Colbert said that he heard "great things" about the lawsuit settlement from Mayor Adams, adding:“As someone who has always been a proud employee of this network, I am offended. And I don’t know if anything will ever repair my trust in this company. But just taking a stab at it, I’d say $16m would help.”Colbert further mentioned that he believed "Paramount knows they could have fought it," given that the company had dubbed the lawsuit one without merit. Joking about the network in this context, Stephen Colbert said:“And keep in mind, Paramount produced Transformers: Rise of the Beast – they know completely without merit."The Late Show host went on to curate his version of Paramount's statement, assuming that the network would've said that Trump may take their money, but he wouldn't be able to take their dignity. Poking fun at the network, Colbert added:"You may, however, purchase our dignity for the low, low price of $16m. We need the cash.” Adam Schiff @SenAdamSchiffLINKJust finished taping with Stephen Colbert who announced his show was cancelled.If Paramount and CBS ended the Late Show for political reasons, the public deserves to know. And deserves better.California's Democratic Senator Adam Schiff took to X on July 18, 2025, and mentioned that the public deserved to know if the talk show was canceled for political reasons.While CBS has dubbed the cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert a financial decision, many doubt whether CBS is being truthful, given that the cancellation was announced days after Colbert's digs against Paramount.