Jimmy Kimmel is back at ABC and returned to the late-night stage Tuesday night.
Kimmel walked out on stage to resounding cheers from the audience. His appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” was his first public response since ABC temporarily suspended production of the show last week.
“I also want to thank all of you. You supported our show, cared enough to do something about it, to make your voices heard so that mine could be heard. I’ll never forget it,” Kimmel said.
Several minutes into his monologue, Kimmel teared up and assured his audience that he never intended to make light of the killing of the conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“And the truth is, I don’t think what I have to say is gonna make much of a difference. If you like me, you like me. If you don’t, you don’t. I have no illusions about changing anyone’s mind,” Kimmel said.
“This show is not important. What is important is that we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this,” Kimmel added.
Kimmel lays into Trump and the FCC’s Carr
In the latter half of his monologue, Kimmel criticized President Donald Trump’s stance on free speech and accused him of being unable to take a joke.
Kimmel said he felt lucky to live in a country where he had the freedom to speak.
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“And that’s something I’m embarrassed to say, I, for granted, until they pulled my friend Stephen off the air, and tried to coerce the affiliates to run our show in the cities that you live in to take my show off the air,” Kimmel said, referring to Stephen Colbert. “That’s not legal. That’s not American. That is un-American.”
Kimmel also slammed Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr, whose comments on a podcast preceded the show’s suspension.
Kimmel then took a jab at Carr for making threats about taking the show off-air. Kimmel called Carr’s statements “a direct violation of the First Amendment” and “not a particularly intelligent threat to make in public.”
“You wanna hear a mob boss make a threat like that? You have to hide a microphone in a deli and park outside in a van with a tape recorder all night. This genius said it on a podcast,” Kimmel added.
Trump weighs in
President Donald Trump took to Truth Social to criticize ABC about an hour before the episode aired.
“I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back. The White House was told by ABC that his Show was canceled!” he said.
“Why would they want someone back who does so poorly, who’s not funny, and who puts the Network in jeopardy by playing 99% positive Democrat GARBAGE,” he added.
Trump wrote in his post that Kimmel was “another arm of the DNC” and said Kimmel’s show was, to the best of his knowledge, a “major Illegal Campaign Contribution.”
“I think we’re going to test ABC out on this. Let’s see how we do,” Trump said, before referencing a bumper settlement he received from ABC after he sued the network for defamation.
“This one sounds even more lucrative. A true bunch of losers,” he added.
Overwhelming support for Kimmel
Prior to Tuesday night’s show, Kimmel had not publicly addressed the suspension. In an Instagram post on Tuesday morning, Kimmel shared a photo of himself and Norman Lear, the late American screenwriter and producer who was known for championing progressive causes.
“Missing this guy today,” Kimmel wrote.
Some fans appeared outside the show’s filming location on Hollywood Boulevard on Tuesday to express their support for the late-night comedian’s return.
Kimmel’s suspension last week had become a cultural flash point that many saw as an encroachment on free speech. Hollywood stars, fellow late-night television hosts, and politicians vocally expressed support for Kimmel. Protesters gathered outside Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California, and in New York, where another rally took place outside of ABC’s offices. Meanwhile, some Disney+ and Hulu subscribers threatened to cancel their subscriptions in protest.
Disney-owned ABC had made the call last week to pull the late-night television star from the air after Kimmel’s comments about Charlie Kirk’s death and President Donald Trump. His comments had drawn backlash from the Federal Communications Commission’s chair, Brendan Carr, and affiliate station owners Nexstar and Sinclair said they wouldn’t air the show.
The situation with Nexstar and Sinclair isn’t settled, despite Kimmel’s return. After the Walt Disney Company announced Kimmel’s return on Monday, Sinclair said in a statement that it would not air the show on its ABC affiliate stations, replacing it with news programming. The company said it was still in discussions with ABC and evaluating the show’s “potential return.” Carr said he supported the company’s decision.
Last week, Sinclair said it would not lift the suspension on Kimmel’s show until “appropriate steps” were taken and called for an apology to Kirk’s family, among other demands.