ABC Pulls Jimmy Kimmel Off Air Due to Charlie Kirk Remarks

ABC has announced that it is pulling Jimmy Kimmel Live—Jimmy Kimmel’s long-running late night series—in response to comments Kimmel made on air about the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was murdered last week in Utah.

The network confirmed the news with a one-sentence statement: “Jimmy Kimmel Live will be pre-empted indefinitely.”

ABC, which is owned by Disney, made the decision after FCC chairman Brendan Carr threatened to take action against Kimmel earlier Wednesday. “This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney. We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Carr, a Donald Trump appointee, told right wing journalist Benny Johnson. “These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

The choice to pull Kimmel also follows Nexstar Media, which owns a large number of TV stations across the country, saying Wednesday that it would pre-empt Kimmel’s program due to a comment Kimmel made about Charlie Kirk on Monday’s show.

“Mr. Kimmel’s comments about the death of Mr. Kirk are offensive and insensitive at a critical time in our national political discourse, and we do not believe they reflect the spectrum of opinions, views, or values of the local communities in which we are located,” said Andrew Alford, President of Nexstar’s broadcasting division. “Continuing to give Mr. Kimmel a broadcast platform in the communities we serve is simply not in the public interest at the current time, and we have made the difficult decision to preempt his show in an effort to let cooler heads prevail as we move toward the resumption of respectful, constructive dialogue.”

The comment in question came when Kimmel was discussing the suspect in Kirk’s murder, Tyler Robinson. “The MAGA Gang (is) 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,” Kimmel said. “In between the finger-pointing, there was grieving.”

In the past, Kimmel has not been shy about his antipathy for conservatives, particularly members of Trump’s administration and the president himself; he has attacked the president as a “fragile snowflake” and “the dumbest criminal in the world,” among other epithets. Trump, in turn, has attacked Kimmel; most recently, he ripped into Kimmel’s performance as host at the 2024 Oscars. Kimmel gleefully read a Truth Social post Trump published during the ceremony: “Has there ever been a worse host than Jimmy Kimmel at the Oscars?” said Kimmel, reading Trump’s post to the audience. “His opening was that of a less-than-average person trying too hard to be something which he is not, and never can be.”

Kimmel has hosted Jimmy Kimmel Live!—the first and as of now only late night series on ABC—since 2003. The network’s abrupt decision to yank him off the air comes exactly two months after CBS announced that it will cancel The Late Show—hosted by frequent Trump critic Stephen Colbert—after the 2025-2026 TV season.

This story is developing.