Jimmy Kimmel’s Removal Comes Amid a Pending Merger for Nexstar

News that ABC is indefinitely pulling Jimmy Kimmel Live! may have been unexpected, but it’s far from unfamiliar.

Much like fellow late-night host Stephen Colbert, the circumstances surrounding Jimmy Kimmel’s removal from the airwaves involve a company in the midst of a merger and under scrutiny from the FCC.

Nexstar Media Group is in the middle of a $6.2 billion merger with media company Tegna. Nexstar, which owns or partners with more than 200 television stations, would acquire about 65 more under the deal. The two companies entered into a definitive agreement for the merger last month, but it remains subject to regulatory approval from the FCC, currently chaired by Brendan Carr.

On Wednesday, Nexstar condemned “recent comments” made by Kimmel and announced that JKL would be pre-empted on its stations “for the foreseeable future.”

Nexstar did not specify which comment it took issue with, but the move came hours after Carr spoke out against Kimmel for a remark he made on Monday night’s broadcast of JKL about the assassination of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk. While public discourse surrounding Kirk’s murder has become a hotbed of vitriol, Kimmel has not offered any direct commentary about Kirk to date. Instead, it was a comment about Kirk’s alleged killer that sparked controversy: “We hit some new lows over the weekend,” Kimmel said in his monologue, “with 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.”

Speaking on Benny Johnson’s podcast The Benny Show, Carr alleged the comment “appears to be an action by Jimmy Kimmel to play into that narrative that this was somehow a MAGA Republican-motivated person,” and raised the possibility of FCC intervention into Kimmel’s actions.

The FCC chairman then called for action from affiliate groups: “Frankly I think it’s past time that a lot of these licensed broadcasters themselves push back on Comcast and Disney, and say, ‘We are going to preempt—we are not going to run Kimmel anymore until you straighten this out,’” Carr said. “It’s time for them to step up and say this garbage—to the extent that that’s what comes down the pipe in the future—isn’t something that serves the needs of our local communities.”

With more than 30 ABC-affiliated owned or partner stations in its portfolio (and 13 more potentially coming via the Tegna merger), Nexstar’s move to pre-empt JKL likely pressured ABC to act at the network level. Networks often act at the behest of their affiliates, who generate significant revenue and connect them with audiences they otherwise couldn’t reach due to FCC-imposed ownership caps limiting networks to 39% of national TV households. Minutes after Nexstar’s move, ABC announced it would pull JKL from its schedule “indefinitely.”

Roughly 30 minutes after Nexstar’s condemnation of Kimmel, the company confirmed that it plans to formally submit its application for FCC merger approval on September 30.

This is familiar territory for the world of late-night TV in recent months, albeit under different circumstances.

A corporate merger awaiting FCC approval also sat at the center of CBS’s unexpected cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert just two months ago to the day.

While CBS called that decision a “purely financial” one made “against a challenging backdrop in late night,” the network has been widely accused—by civilians and politicians alike—of cutting the show to curry favor with President Donald Trump amid the pending merger of its parent company Paramount with Skydance Media. Skydance founder and CEO David Ellison is often seen as a close ally of Trump. At the time, the Paramount-Skydance deal also required approval from Carr’s FCC. Carr, like Ellison, has been an oft-cited Trump ally. Days before his cancellation, Colbert had called CBS’s settlement with Trump in its 60 Minutes lawsuit “a big fat bribe.”

Carr’s FCC approved the Paramount-Skydance merger the following month.

Following Nexstar’s sanction against Kimmel, Carr celebrated the move. “I want to thank Nexstar for doing the right thing…” he posted on X. “While this may be an unprecedented decision, it is important for broadcasters to push back on Disney programming that they determine falls short of community values. I hope that other broadcasters follow Nexstar’s lead.”

The FCC chairman issued a markedly less professional reaction when ABC followed suit, sending journalist Brian Stelter a GIF from The Office showing Michael Scott and Dwight Schrute raising their hands in celebration.

Following Kirk’s death, Kimmel had issued a statement of sympathy on social media. “Instead of the angry finger-pointing, can we just for one day agree that it is horrible and monstrous to shoot another human?” he posted on Instagram. “On behalf of my family, we send love to the Kirks and to all the children, parents, and innocents who fall victim to senseless gun violence.”