ABC shared that “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” would be pulled from its late-night lineup “indefinitely” following the late-night host’s comments about Charlie Kirk‘s killer.
Earlier this week, Kimmel said that conservative commentators were attempting to “score political points” from Kirk’s assassination in Utah. He speculated that the gunman was a fellow Republican and mocked the rush to pin blame on political opponents.
“The MAGA Gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said. “In between the finger-pointing, there was grieving.”
While the network did not give a reason for the decision, it followed threats of “action” against ABC and parent company Disney from FCC Chair Brendan Carr. Carr called Kimmel’s comments “the sickest conduct possible” and made noises about revoking broadcast licenses over the joke in an interview with conservative podcaster Benny Johnson.
“These companies can find ways to change conduct and take actions on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead,” Carr said.
ABC was facing pressure from Nexstar Media Group, the largest owner of local television stations in the United States. That company said it would pre-empt Kimmel’s program “for the foreseeable future.”
“Nexstar strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk and will replace the show with other programming in its ABC-affiliated markets,” Nexstar said on Wednesday.
The decision to pull Kimmel is not the first time that ABC has bowed out of a fight with the Trump administration. The network settled a defamation lawsuit filed by President Donald Trump earlier this year. That suit came after host George Stephanopoulos said the president had been found “liable for rape” while talking about writer E. Jean Carroll’s court cases against the president. The judge who presided over the Trump trial admitted that a jury found Trump liable of sexual abuse and defamation, not rape, but called it a distinction without a difference in the real world.
“The finding that Ms. Carroll failed to prove that she was ‘raped’ within the meaning of the New York Penal Law does not mean that she failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape,’ ” Kaplan wrote in a filing in 2023.
ABC wasn’t willing to try that argument in a different court, opting instead to pay $15 million to Trump’s charitable foundation and museum.
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Kimmel’s half-firing follows CBS‘ announcement of the end of “The Late Show.” Host and frequent Trump critic Stephen Colbert was blindsided by the news, which came as CBS’ parent company was attempting a massive merger that needed Trump administration approval. After the show won an Emmy earlier this week, Colbert encouraged Americans to “be brave” in the coming years.
“Sometimes you only truly know how much you love something when you get a sense that you might be losing it,” he said. “Ten years later, in September of 2025, my friends, I have never loved my country more desperately. God bless America. Stay strong.”
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