Jimmy Kimmel’s Show Suspended By ABC 

Maeve Bidonde, Staff Writer

Recently ABC made the decision to suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s show after a series of perceived negative comments he made in relation to Charlie Kirk’s death. According to AP News, one such comment Kimmel said was, “many in MAGA land are working very hard to capitalize on the murder of Charlie Kirk.” The suspension came after Nexstar Communications Group, which operates twenty-three ABC affiliates, pulled Kimmel’s show starting that Wednesday, September 17^th. The President of the company, Andrew Alford, said that the comments Kimmel made around Kirk’s death “are offensive and insensitive at a critical time in our national political discourse.” After the suspension was announced, President Donald Trump posted on his platform, Truth Social, seemingly to celebrate ABC’s decision. The post read, “Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done.”  

After Trump’s post, the FCC Chairman Brendan Carr went on the Benny Johnson podcast saying, “This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.” Disney and Nexstar have FCC related business in the near future as Disney needs regulatory approval for ESPN to acquire the NFL Network next month. Nexstar needs the Trump Administration to give the go ahead on a $6.2 million purchase of Tegna, a broadcast rival of theirs. If both companies reinstated Kimmel, they would risk not getting the approval they need for their next business moves. 

Prior to Kimmel’s suspension, Stephen Colbert’s show was cancelled and President Trump posted on Truth Social hinting that Kimmel would be next, and he was. The post about Colbert read, “I absolutely love that Colbert got fired. His talent was even less than his ratings. I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next.” Ari Cohn lead counsel for tech policy at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression said that the situation with ABC and Kimmel is, “another media outlet withered under government pressure, ensuring that the administration will continue to extort and exact retribution on broadcasters and publishers who criticize it, We cannot be a country where late-night talk show hosts serve at the pleasure of the president.” 

FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez also criticized Carr and the Trump Administration for the way they are “using the weight of government power to suppress lawful expression.” According to The New York Times, Kimmel made his late-night comeback last week. Despite Nexstar and Sinclair preempting the show, Kimmel was still able to rake in an average of 6.2 million viewers which surpassed his usual numbers even without the viewers using streaming services to watch it. Sinclair and Nexstar cover about 20% of ABC’s national audience combined. In the previous year ABC had settled with Trump for a $16 million defamation suit he filed. Trump went as far as to hint at suing ABC a second time for reinstatement of Kimmel’s show and referred to the network as “fake news.” Overall, the reaction to Kimmel coming back on the air was divided especially within ABC broadcasting affiliates.