The hosts of The View finally addressed Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension on Monday.
“Did you really think we weren’t going to talk about Jimmy Kimmel?” Whoopi Goldberg said to open the show. “I mean have you watched the show over the last 29 seasons?”
Her comments came after a fan outcry over the ABC show’s perceived silence on the debacle.
“No one silences us… We’re still here, we’re still broadcasting, and when the news broke last week about Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension, we took a breath to see if Jimmy was going to say anything about it first,” she said, pointing out they the hosts did “the same thing with Stephen Colbert.”
Kimmel has yet to address his show’s indefinite suspension over his comments about assassinated conservative figure Charlie Kirk on Tuesday.
“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 doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said on air, prompting the disciplinary action from ABC.
Months after a Daily Beast report in May revealed The View hosts were asked to simmer down the show’s Trump criticism, fans assumed the hosts ignored Kimmel’s suspension on its shows at the end of last week to follow orders from executives of their shared network with Jimmy Kimmel Live.
“I bet the ladies of The View was given orders not to discuss Jimmy Kimmel today,” one viewer wrote on X. Added another last week, “The fact that they are not opening the show with talking about @ABC cancelling Jimmy Kimmel by caving to fascism is very telling.”
Goldberg fiercely pushed back on that narrative Monday. “Our show was on tape on Friday, but we’re live here today and we’re getting into it now,” Goldberg said, though the hosts avoided pointing the finger at ABC. “One can say something they shouldn’t and get taken off the air, but the government cannot apply pressure to force someone to be silenced—and you may be surprised to see who agrees with us at this table,” she said before playing a montage of conservative lawmakers who criticized FCC Chairman Brendan Carr for meddling in the broadcasts of anti-Trump TV personalities.
Ana Navarro echoed the comments Kimmel made last week that led to his suspension when she weighed in.
“The horrible, senseless assassination of Charlie Kirk, a man I disagreed with, but who stood for debate, who stood for freedom of speech, is being used to silence people and cancel people,” she said.
Navarro also agreed with fans that they’d have a right to be outraged if the hosts avoided discussing Kimmel at its “Hot Topics” table.
“I want to start by thanking our loyal viewers for demanding truth and courage from us. We deserve it. You deserve it and we will give it to you,” she said.
Other stars standing in solidarity with Kimmel include Howard Stern, who announced he’d canceled his Disney+ subscription to boycott ABC’s decision—Tom Hanks, Jennifer Aniston, and more.
No decisions have been revealed about what it will take to get Kimmel back on the air, though Variety reports that the conversations are ongoing.
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