Jimmy Kimmel returned to late-night television Tuesday with no apology to Donald Trump or MAGA—and an emotional address to Charlie Kirk’s widow.
Kimmel was pulled from the air by ABC’s owner Disney last Wednesday amid pressure from Trump’s Federal Communications Commission chairman, Brendan Carr, over his comments about Kirk’s alleged killer.
After a lengthy standing ovation and chants of his name, Kimmel began his monologue with a few jokes before getting to the heart of the matter.
Kimmel thanked his fellow late-night hosts for their support, as well as the “courage” shown by uncommon allies—including Sen. Ted Cruz—“who don’t support my show and what I believe, but support my right to share those beliefs anyway.”
“I’ve been hearing a lot about what I need to say and do tonight, and the truth is, I don’t think what I have to say is going to make much of a difference,” Kimmel said. “If you like me, you like me; if you don’t, you don’t. I have no illusions about changing anyone’s mind.”
Kimmel then addressed Kirk’s murder, and his previous comments that ignited the firestorm.
“I want to make something clear, because it’s important to me as a human, and that is you understand that it was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” he said, choking up.
“I don’t think there’s anything funny about it. I posted a message on Instagram on the day he was killed sending love to his family and asking for compassion—and I meant it. And I still do,“ Kimmel said.
“Nor was it my intention to blame any specific group for the actions. It was a deeply disturbed individual. That was really the opposite of the point I was trying to make, but to some, that felt ill-timed or unclear or maybe both, and for those who think I did point a finger, I get why you’re upset,” he continued.
“If the situation was reversed, there’s a good chance I would have felt the same way. I have many friends and family members on the other side who I love and remain close to, even though we don’t agree on politics at all. I don’t think the murderer who shot Charlie Kirk represents anyone. This was a sick person who believed violence was a solution, and it isn’t. It isn’t ever.”
Kimmel then forcefully pushed back on the FCC and Carr.
Carr pressuring Disney was not only “a direct violation of the First Amendment,” Kimmel said, but it “is not a particularly intelligent threat to make in public.”
“Ted Cruz said he sounded like a mafioso. I don’t know. If you want to 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 long.”
Kimmel also used Carr’s own words against him—pointing to a 2022 tweet in which he agreed with then-President Joe Biden by praising political satire as “one of the oldest and most important forms of free speech.”
And as for Trump, Kimmel joked: “He might have to release the Epstein files to distract us from this—now!”
“Our leader celebrates Americans losing their livelihoods because he can’t take a joke,” Kimmel said.
“He was somehow able to squeeze Colbert out of CBS. Then he turned his sights on me. And now he’s openly rooting for NBC to fire Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers, and the hundreds of Americans who work for their shows, who don’t make millions of dollars,” he noted.
“And I hope that if that happens, or if there’s even any hint of that happening, you will be 10 times as loud as you were this week. We have to speak out against this.”
