Why ABC ousted Jimmy Kimmel for calling Charlie Kirk’s killer a MAGA member

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Jimmy Kimmel didn’t learn the digital room.

And it value him his job.

Now that Disney and ABC executives, after huddling all day, pulled the plug as Kimmel was getting ready for Wednesday evening’s present, it’s laborious to see him returning. The brass stated he’s suspended "indefinitely," which means "lose our quantity."

There are severe free speech considerations right here, particularly towards the backdrop of government pressure.

Nexstar, an ABC affiliate that owns NewsNation, additionally stated it will preempt the present on its stations.

DISNEY PULLS JIMMY KIMMEL'S SHOW AFTER COMMENTS ON CHARLIE KIRK'S ASSASSINATION AND MORE TOP HEADLINES

Jimmy Kimmel was suspended from his late evening present "indefinitely" for feedback he made about Charlie Kirk's assassination. (Michael Le Brecht/Disney by way of Getty Photos)

With Stephen Colbert confined to a last season at CBS, that may imply two of the three late-night hosts on broadcast networks could be banished. Each are social commentators, in fact, and fervently anti-Trump.

One pleased camper is Donald Trump, who has been feuding with Kimmel. (I performed a small function in that, as we’ll see in a second.)

Trump congratulated ABC on having the "braveness" as well Jimmy. When the Colbert information broke, the president predicted that Kimmel could be subsequent.

What Kimmel stated, within the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination , isn’t that terrible. It’s in regards to the killer, not, as some early headlines had it, Charlie himself.

Proper after the taking pictures, in actual fact, Kimmel supplied a somber, respectful response, sending his like to Kirk’s household.

However then he was tone-deaf in regards to the sensitivity of the state of affairs and the widespread anger – particularly amongst younger conservative activists , but additionally those that disagreed with Kirk. The ambiance proper now is sort of a tinderbox that solely wanted a single match.

These are the phrases from Monday that obtained him in bother:

"We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately attempting to characterize this child who murdered Charlie Kirk as something aside from one in every of them."

That’s it.

Charlie Kirk speaks at Utah Valley College on Sept. 10, 2025 in Orem, Utah, previous to his assassination. (Trent Nelson/The Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Photos)

I don’t agree that the killer was a part of the Trump movement . I don’t assume he was a part of any motion, only a crazed madman with a transgender companion who had sympathy for gays however not "fascists." As with all these nutjob murderers and faculty shooters, the media’s search on a "motive" is futile.

A month from now, possibly Kimmel’s sentence wouldn’t have brought about an uproar. However he ought to have sensed that this was not the time.

Now let’s take a look at what the opposite facet has been saying.

Trump, who was near Kirk, says left-wing radicals are responsible for his killing and that investigations are below means. Elon Musk has labeled "the left" as "the get together of homicide." Pam Bondi stated she would prosecute these responsible of "hate speech," apparently lacking the purpose that the First Modification is meaningless except it protects vile speech – so long as it doesn’t embody threats of violence.

Towards that ocean of rhetoric, Kimmel’s remark was a small trickle.

And that brings us to the Federal Communications Commission , which has the ability to revoke broadcast licenses.

FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, who I not too long ago interviewed, stated this on a podcast:

"We will do that the simple means or the laborious means. These firms can discover methods to alter conduct and take motion, frankly, on Kimmel or there’s going to be further work for the FCC forward."

Sounds fairly ominous.

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However Carr kinda sorta walked it again at a Politico convention. "I feel you possibly can draw a reasonably clear line, and the Supreme Courtroom has accomplished this for many years, that our First Modification, our free speech custom, protects virtually all speech."

Even Laura Ingraham stated Carr ought to have stayed off TV.

Trump, in the meantime, urged NBC to fireplace "two whole losers," Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers, which might imply a clear sweep of the late-night panorama.

It’s value reminding everybody that Charlie Kirk was participating in free speech – and advocating non-violence – as he toured the nation and constructed his Turning Level group.

Celebrities, Democrats and a few journalists are denouncing the Disney/ABC choice to explode "Jimmy Kimmel Reside." That makes me ponder whether, as within the case of Colbert’s "Late Present," it was shedding cash – or making comparatively little cash – and the feedback offered the pretext for getting it off the books.

Now to the backstory. After I sat down with Trump at Mar-a-Lago final 12 months, it was proper after the Oscars, hosted, because it turned out, by Kimmel.

President Donald Trump speaks at a dinner with Senate Republicans at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Seashore, Fla., Friday, Feb. 7, 2025. ( AP Picture/Ben Curtis)

And he made a joke about Trump: "Isn’t it previous your jail time?"

So let the file present that Jimmy began it – no less than this spherical.

So I requested the candidate if he had a response.

"Each evening he hits me, I suppose," stated Trump. "His scores are horrible… So I figured I’d hit him, as a result of I assumed he was a awful host."

Referring to stories that some Kimmel confidantes had begged him to not make the jail joke, Trump advised me: "This man’s even dumber than I assumed."

Oh, however that wasn’t the top of it.

In his inevitable pushback, Kimmel stated in fact Fox had picked a man to interview Trump "that nobody’s ever heard of."

Properly! I’d solely hosted the No. 1 cable present in its time slot for a dozen years, however I suppose that didn’t matter to the rich La-la-land elite.

I shot again that whereas I wasn’t a closely hyped community star like him, my Sunday scores virtually matched his. I used my higher-than-normal ranking from the Trump interview, however let’s not get slowed down in particulars.

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I’ll give the ultimate phrase to Outkick founder Clay Travis , the conservative radio host and frequent visitor of mine:

"I like Jimmy and his household and have recognized them for years now. I don’t just like the idea — as somebody who talks for a residing — of any particular person in any inventive trade shedding their job for anybody factor they are saying."

Travis says there have been frequent makes an attempt to cancel him, including: "In case your precept shifts based mostly on who has energy, you really don't have any rules."

Footnote : I want most media folks, aside from these masking hard-news developments, would cease utilizing the title of the suspect within the Charlie Kirk case.

Donald Trump was a visitor on "Jimmy Kimmel Reside" in 2015 previous to successful the presidency. (Randy Holmes/Disney Basic Leisure Content material)

For a few years, I've refused to call assassins , would-be assassins, mass shooters and faculty shooters, as a result of that may give them the eye they crave. Simply not gonna go there.

Do you keep in mind the title of the killers at Sandy Hook, Virginia Tech, the Orlando nightclub, the Las Vegas music pageant, the Charleston church, Buffalo, Uvalde, and even the Colorado college a few weeks in the past? I don’t both. The quicker we will consign them to the dustbin of historical past, the higher.

Lavishing consideration on them could encourage different would-be gunmen to take motion, considering it’s a option to flip nobodies into somebodies.

And right here’s absolutely the proof from the alleged Kirk killer.

The 22-year-old texted his roommate, his romantic companion, about what he had inscribed on the bullet casings.

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If these messages wound up "on fox new[s] I might need a stroke."

That’s why I say it’s harmful to reward these heinous figures by making them family names.

Howard Kurtz is a media and political analyst and the previous host of FOX Information Channel's MediaBuzz . Based mostly in Washington, D.C., he joined the community in 2013 and recurrently seems on Particular Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum amongst different applications.