What He Said On First Show Back

Jimmy Kimmel got a large standing ovation with chants of “Jimmy, Jimmy” from the studio audience.

In a very emotional monologue, Kimmel kicked off with a reference to Jack Paar when he quit and returned to The Tonight Show in 1960. “As I was saying before I was interrupted…,” he joked.

Kimmel thanked his fans as well as those who “don’t support my show and what I believe, but support my right to share those beliefs”.

He added that, “Our government cannot be allowed to control what we do and do not say on television.”

He teared up when referencing Charlie Kirk. “It was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” he said.

Kimmel didn’t stop making Trump jokes, either.

Kimmel stepped on to the stage of the El Capital Theater just after 6pm and the taping lasted just over an hour. Crowd members told Deadline that the atmosphere inside the theater was “electric” and Kimmel received more standing ovations during his monologue than the crew would have liked.

An hour before the show went out, Trump doubled down on his attacks on ABC and Kimmel, calling them a “true bunch of losers” and that he would be “going to test ABC out on this”.

Kimmel’s monologue come 24 hours about ABC revealed that it was bringing the show back after “thoughtful conversations” between the comedian and Disney.

Disney admitted that it made the decision to indefinitely preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! to “avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country”. The company, in its statement said that it felt the comments were “ill-timed and thus insensitive”.

Kimmel, on his show a week ago Monday, said: “We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and with everything they can to score political points from it.”

FCC chairman Brendan Carr subsequently threatened ABC to “find ways to change conduct, to take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead” and said that the comedian’s comments were “some of the sickest conduct possible.”

Carr later walked back his comments, claiming that he denied he was making a threat to pull licenses of ABC stations.

After Carr’s initial comments, local station group Nexstar revealed that it would “preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! for the foreseeable future” as it “strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk.” It soon was followed by similar comments from rival station group Sinclair.

Moments later, Disney made its own decision to pause the show.

This was followed by intensive discussions with the late-night host as the controversy continued to blow up over the weekend. Tom Hanks, who played Walt Disney in Saving Mr. Banks, was one of more than 400 stars, alongside the likes of Meryl Streep, Ben Affleck, Ben Stiller and Lin-Manuel Miranda, who signed an ACLU letter calling out “government threats to our freedom of speech”.

Former Disney CEO Michael Eisner also got involved, asking “where has all the leadership gone?”, comments that are thought to have rankled current Disney CEO Bob Iger.

Kimmel also received support from his late-night peers and fellow Strike Force 5 podcasts including Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, and Seth Meyers but it was John Oliver who struck an even bigger blow, calling out Iger himself.

“History is also going to remember the cowards who definitely knew better but still let things happen, whether it was for money, convenience, or just comfort,” Oliver said on HBO’s Last Week Tonight.

Even some right-wing politicians such as Ted Cruz — who is Chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, the body that has oversight over the FCC — warned it was dangerous for government to silence free speech as Democrats, when they next enter the White House, could use the precedent to silence conservatives.

Nexstar and Sinclair have continued to preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live!, meaning that the show is not available to watch live in around a quarter of the country.