Like many of the night’s quips, rants, impressions and wisecracks, it was both a joke — and serious. It was comedy as an “act of resistance,” said Obeidallah, a way of empowering Muslims and racial minorities to talk back to the incoming powers that be. Namely, Donald Trump.

For years, “The Big Brown Comedy Hour” has been a regular feature at Comic Strip Live. But this Sunday night was different. The inauguration was days away, and some of the comedians, many of whom were Muslim and of Middle Eastern or South Asian descent, expressed deep uneasiness about Trump’s impending presidency. The evening’s event was dubbed “The Last Show Before Trump Deports Us.”