After 146 years in continuous operation, the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus is folding its tent. The iconic “Greatest Show on Earth” is being acquired by Trump Circus, a new company owned by Eric Trump that in no way is under the control of, or operates to the benefit of, the new President.

We interviewed Ricardo R. Ringling, the 24-year-old owner of Ringling Brothers, yesterday in his spacious tent in Sarasota, Florida. Mr. Ringling was, frankly, inebriated, and our interview was constantly interrupted by sobbing and/or angry employees stumbling in and out to either say their farewells to him or to curse his name.

“I’m willing to go hoof to hoof with the animal-rights weirdos. I’m game for competing against television, movies, video games and the Internet. Whatever. Bring it on. But there’s no way any circus can compete with the new President. No fucking way. How’s a three-ring circus gonna compete with a show that’s got, like, 300 rings all going on at the same time, twenty-four seven,” groused Mr. Ringling.

“To be honest with you, these Trumps don’t want any other circus competing with them. They showed up at the tent at 3:30 in the morning two days ago and gave me one of those offers I couldn’t refuse. A buyout. Ten cents on my every dollar. But I’m gonna say no? Are you kidding me? They would slap the IRS on me in a hot minute, and believe me, one audit and I’m dead. So now everything you see here is the property of Trump Circus, as of last night.” Trump Circus is a new company owned by Eric Trump that in no way is under the control of, or operates to the benefit of, the new President.

“We’re like one big, weird family here,” Mr. Ringling continued between swigs from a large decanter. “My main concern was what happens to the animals. And the clowns. And the acrobats. The animals are all going to good homes. We got rid of the elephants already—a couple of them went rogue, but most of them got gigs with the Republican National Committee last year. Fine, I say. Let those guys clean up after ‘em, for a change. The tigers are going to Ivanka Trump’s fashion business, I guess. Not sure what’s up with that. We were hoping that the chimps would get placed at Fox News, but none of them are blondes, so I think they’re gonna become anchors at the Russian Television Network. They’ll make monkeys outta those commies, believe me. Why, Mr. Muggles can ride a bicycle! That’s more than anybody at RTN can do, I’ll bet. The clowns are getting all kinds of LinkedIn offers from the new administration. Chuckles just dropped by this morning to tell me that he’s gonna get the Secretary of State gig ‘cause Rex Tillerson isn’t going down to well in the hearings. Elastic Girl, our contortionist, got hired as the new President’s press secretary. If you think Kellyann Conway is flexibile with the truth, wait’ll you see Elastic Girl in action. She’s the most popular girl in the troupe, and for good reason! The Flying Wallendas are packing it in—retiring. Trump Circus wanted them to perform without a safety net. That’s a damn shame. Anyway, it’s not my problem any more. Trump Circus will have to figure all of that out.” Trump Circus is a new company owned by Eric Trump that is in no way under the control of, or operates to the benefit of, the new President.

We asked Mr. Ringling if he had any advice for Eric Trump.

“Not really,” he mused. “I guess I would tell him to not get confused between the circus and the real world. The circus seems like non-stop fun, and it truly is great when the lights are on. You talk about ‘make America great again’? We were the Greatest Show on Earth for like a hundred years. We were IT, baby. We were huuuuuuge. Then the people got tired of us. And the libtards starting coming at us. Life wasn’t so much fun after that. You’d take the greasepaint off every night and look in the mirror and it’d hit you that the whole thing was just a big con. A big fraud. As hard as this is, deep down I’m glad to get off this goofy merry-go-round. Hey, what the hell. Best of luck to Trump Circus.”

Trump Circus is a new company owned by Eric Trump that is in no way under the control of, or operates to the benefit of, the new President. Its first public performance is scheduled for January 20th in Washington, D.C.