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Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel opened his mouth and stirred up another hornet’s nest, so some are claiming. Kimmel made a rather inappropriate comment about first lady Melania Trump just days before another presidential assassination attempt. Some are calling for the comedian to be fired. Meanwhile, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced it would review ABC’s eight broadcasting licenses – in some cases, years before their renewal is due.
Action and Reaction
Last week, Kimmel stood on his stage and pretended to be the emcee of a White House Correspondents’ Dinner, just two days before the actual event took place. He acted like he was addressing Mrs. Trump and said to the audience, “Look at her. So beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow.” Flash forward to the actual dinner: A 31-year-old man managed to breach security just outside the hotel, carrying weapons, an act that is being considered (in some circles) an assassination attempt on the president.
The Trumps took to social media, calling for the host to be removed from the show. Melania posted, “Kimmel’s hateful and violent rhetoric is intended to divide our country. His monologue about my family isn’t comedy- his words are corrosive and deepens the political sickness within America.” She continued:
“People like Kimmel shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate. A coward, Kimmel hides behind ABC because he knows the network will keep running cover to protect him. Enough is enough. It is time for ABC to take a stand. How many times will ABC’s leadership enable Kimmel’s atrocious behavior at the expense of our community.”
Kimmel, of course, defended himself without apologizing, saying on his show, “It was a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80 and she’s younger than I am. It was not by any stretch of the definition a call to assassination, and they know that.”
FCC Eyes Disney and ABC
Soon after Kimmel’s remark and the Trumps’ response, the FCC announced its investigation into ABC’s broadcasting licenses. To be clear, the FCC does have the right to review licenses that are up for renewal. What makes this noteworthy, though, is that these stations were not up for renewal until 2028 at the earliest, and 2031 at the latest. Now, however, they will have to file for renewal by May 28 of this year.
The FCC, led by Brendan Carr, doesn’t grant licenses to national television networks. Instead, it is considered a watchdog and individually licenses each station that broadcasts over the public airwaves. Carr has repeatedly threatened to go after broadcasters, including taking away their station licenses, citing political favoritism and public interest.
“This is about as extreme an action as I’ve ever seen the F.C.C. take against a broadcaster for frivolous reasons,” said Gigi Sohn, a senior staff member at the agency during the Obama administration. “It’s a message to every other network, ‘Watch yourself, you might be next.’”
Jameel Jaffer, executive director at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, said in a statement on Tuesday that if Mr. Trump “gets his way, we’ll have only government-aligned media organizations that broadcast only government-approved news and commentary.” He added, “It would be difficult to imagine an outcome more corrosive to democracy or more offensive to the First Amendment.”
The timing has caused speculation that Kimmel’s remarks were what triggered the FCC to begin the investigation; however, the agency has been looking into Disney for a while now. During a podcast earlier this week, Carr said, “There’s evidence suggests that Disney literally was dividing and categorizing employees based on race and gender ... giving different opportunities to people based on their race or gender or other protected class. And we’re going to get some more discovery from Disney on that.”
The FCC has also been investigating the ABC daytime talk show The View for possibly violating rules about providing equal time for opposing political candidates.
Broadcasting Roasts
Kimmel was recently suspended from his show for a week after inappropriate comments about the murder of Charlie Kirk, igniting a freedom of speech debate. Left-leaning media have certainly been busy roasting Republicans and Conservatives, and their quips and digs are only getting deeper. However, no president has been raked over the coals as much as Donald Trump.
“Late-night hosts told more than ten times as many jokes about Donald Trump than any other political figure in 2025—adding up to a whopping 7,045 jokes total throughout the year,” LateNighter reported. For comparison, former President Joe Biden had just 220 jokes during that period. To break it down even further, LateNighter revealed:
“Trump was the most frequent joke target on each individual show included in the analysis. On Late Night with Seth Meyers, Trump accounted for 1,885 jokes, while Jimmy Kimmel Live! tallied 1,668 Trump jokes, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert logged 1,458.
“In total, the study counted 13,097 political jokes across 818 episodes in 2025. Of those, 12,011 were directed at conservative figures or institutions, while 982 targeted liberals and 104 were classified as non-partisan. Trump jokes alone accounted for more than half of all political jokes tallied during the year.”
The Media Research Center reviewed every joke told on late-night television between September 3 and October 25 during the 2024 presidential campaign. It found a total of 1,463 jokes told over five shows regarding candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. “Of these, 1,428 of the jokes were targeted at Donald Trump. Meaning, just 35 were told about Kamala Harris,” a 98% to 2% ratio.
And, as we’ve already seen, not all of these “jokes” were comedic. Many were what some might call hate speech and rhetoric to divide the country. So, does that give the FCC fodder to go after some of these broadcasters? Perhaps. But even if the agency does decline to renew the stations’ licenses, it will be a long, hard battle to win. Meanwhile, the show will go on.
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