Jimmy Kimmel Live will return to the air this week, following its controversial suspension due to comments relating to the murder of Charlie Kirk.
Last week, it was announced that the late night host’s show had been pulled from the ABC Network, which is owned by Disney, over Kimmel’s comments following the killing of the right-wing activist.
Kirk was shot in the neck and killed at Utah Valley University campus on September 10, and, following the incident, Kimmel said that all signs pointed to Kirk’s shooter being a Trump supporter.
“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang trying to characterise this kid who killed Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” he said in his Monday night monologue.
The subsequent fallout saw the show taken off-air indefinitely, a move that sparked a strong response from either side of the political spectrum. President Donald Trump celebrated the decision, while most of Hollywood’s labour unions reacted to the decision with anger and protest.
On Monday (September 22), the Walt Disney Company said in a statement: “Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country.
“It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive. We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.”
Reports had emerged in recent days that Kimmel’s business and legal representatives were in discussions with Disney and ABC executives in the hope of reaching a compromise.
Among those to speak out against the suspension were talk show legends Stephen Colbert and David Letterman, citing concerns relating to free speech, as well as comedian and podcaster Marc Maron, who called it “government censorship”, Olivia Rodrigo, who labelled it “blatant censorship”, and Pedro Pascal, who stressed the importance of free speech and democracy.
Over the weekend, John Cleese and Piers Morgan clashed over the cancellation after Morgan questioned Kimmel being “heralded as some kind of free speech martyr”.
The topic worked itself into Trump’s speech at Kirk’s memorial on Sunday (September 21), where he once again took aim at his political opponents on the “radical left” and addressed the backlash about Kimmel’s show being axed.
“The same commentators who this week are screaming fascism over a cancelled late-night TV show, where the anchor had no talent and no ratings, last week were implying that Charlie Kirk deserved what happened to him,” he said.
