Jimmy Kimmel took fresh aim at Donald Trump on Thursday night’s Jimmy Kimmel Live!, responding to the president’s latest after-midnight Truth Social post calling for ABC to remove the late-night host from the air.
Trump’s post repeated familiar attacks on Kimmel’s talent and ratings, questioning why ABC and its station groups “put up with it,” and urging them to “get the bum off the air.”
Kimmel opened Thursday night’s show by recounting how he learned of the post early Thursday. “My wife comes out of the bathroom, she goes, ‘Trump tweeted you should be fired again,’” he said. “I was like, ‘Oh.’ Then I went downstairs and made bagels for the kids.”
Reading the post aloud, Kimmel paused when the audience booed. “I’m the bum? I’m the bum?” he asked. He also pointed out the timestamp. “He posted this at 12:49 a.m., eleven minutes after the show ended on the East Coast… Which is nice. He watches us live. Hi, Mr. President! Thanks for watching us on TV instead of on YouTube. It’s viewers like you who keep us on the air, ironically.”
Kimmel then moved to Trump’s criticism of the show’s ratings. “He keeps saying we have bad ratings,” Kimmel said. “And you should listen to him, because if anyone knows about bad ratings, it’s that guy.” He followed the remark with a montage of news coverage spotlighting Trump’s plummeting approval numbers.
The host framed the dust-up as a recurring pattern. “I have honestly lost count of how many times the president has demanded I be pulled off the air,” he said. “Talk about a snowflake — this guy. Every five weeks, he flips out and wants me fired. If you got this many threats from a neighbor, you’d have no problem getting a restraining order.”
Turning to the camera, Kimmel addressed Trump directly: “You’ve done this before. You tried to get me fired in September, it didn’t work, Mr. President.” He then offered a tongue-in-cheek deal: “How about this: I’ll go when you go, okay? We’ll be a team. Let’s ride off into the sunset together like Butch Cassidy and the Suntan Kid.” He capped the segment by quoting Trump’s own words: “Until then… ‘quiet, piggy.’”
The president’s Wednesday night attack on Kimmel came the same day that the FCC, under the leadership of Trump’s handpicked chair Brendan Carr, announced an inquiry into whether television networks exert “undue influence” on their affiliates to carry their programming.
As we’ve reported, the inquiry appears to be a direct outgrowth of Kimmel’s suspension saga earlier this fall, when ABC’s affiliation agreements—which tie access to high-value programming like the NFL to network clearance—left two of the network’s largest station groups little choice but to reinstate Jimmy Kimmel Live! on their stations.
Watch Kimmel’s full Thursday night monologue at the top of this post.
You GO, Kimmel!!!
ABC: keep Kimmel. Show a little backbone.