Jimmy Kimmel will go back on air after his late-night show was pulled last week, Disney-owned broadcaster ABC announced on Monday.
Kimmel’s show is set to return on Tuesday night, after a weeklong impasse during which ABC faced backlash over its decision to cancel it, and close to $5bn was wiped from Disney’s stock market value.
The Walt Disney Company, which owns ABC, said in a statement on Monday that Kimmel’s show had been indefinitely pulled off the air on September 17 to avoid escalating tensions during 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.”
The statement added further: “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.”
Experts say Disney’s decision to bring Kimmel’s show back on air was probably motivated by business interests, since many consumers were ending their subscriptions to Disney’s streaming services.
“Consumers were exercising their own First Amendment rights and ending their subscriptions to the company’s streaming services,” Susan Campbell, a media studies professor at the University of New Haven in Connecticut, told the Reuters news agency.
When will Jimmy Kimmel come back on air?
Kimmel’s show, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, is set to return on Tuesday night at its usual 11:35pm ET (Wednesday, 03:35 GMT) slot. It can be viewed on abc.com or streamed on Hulu.
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Sinclair, a major owner of local TV stations that operates more than 30 local ABC affiliates, said those, however, would replace Kimmel’s show with news programming instead.
Why was Kimmel’s show cancelled in the first place?
On September 10, conservative influencer Charlie Kirk was fatally shot in front of 3,000 people while he was speaking at a Utah university event. After a 33-hour manhunt, Tyler Robinson, 22, was arrested and charged with aggravated murder. Right-wing figures claimed Robinson was “left-wing”.
In response to this, Kimmel criticised US President Donald Trump and his MAGA (Make America Great Again) supporters’ reactions to Kirk’s death.
Kimmel said on his show: “The MAGA gang (is) desperately trying to characterise 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 added that Trump’s reaction to Kirk’s death was not “how an adult grieves the murder of someone he calls a friend. This is how a four-year-old mourns a goldfish.”
Following general outrage from conservatives about Kimmel’s comments, broadcast groups Nexstar and Sinclair also pulled his show on September 17. While Sinclair will run news programming instead of Kimmel’s show, it is as yet unclear if Nexstar plans to reinstate the programme.
Then, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman Brendan Carr called for action against Kimmel, Disney and ABC, a move which has been criticised as “overreach” by the one Democrat on the FCC, Anna Gomez, and legal experts.
What do critics of ABC’s decision to remove his show say?
The decision to remove Kimmel’s show from the air has been widely criticised by lawmakers, legal experts, Hollywood stars and fellow talk-show hosts as an infringement on his right to free speech, as guaranteed under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
Since the September 17 suspension was announced, viewers have been posting online to announce they are cancelling their subscriptions to Disney’s online streaming platform, Disney+, and ABC’s platform Hulu, using hashtags such as #CancelDisney and #CancelABC.
Some fellow celebrities joined in, as well. Actor Misha Collins, known for television show Supernatural, posted on X on September 18: “I’m canceling my @DisneyPlus subscription ‘indefinitely’.”
Furthermore, at least five Hollywood unions, comprising more than 400,000 broadcast and film workers, have spoken out against the company.
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Former US President Barack Obama shared a series of articles and commentary on X on September 19, saying: “This commentary offers a clear, powerful statement of why freedom of speech is at the heart of democracy and must be defended, whether the speaker is Charlie Kirk or Jimmy Kimmel, MAGA supporters or MAGA opponents.”
In another post, Obama wrote: “This is precisely the kind of government coercion that the First Amendment was designed to prevent – and media companies need to start standing up rather than capitulating to it.”
Ken Martin, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said in a statement: “The state under Donald Trump has amassed a chilling record of restricting speech, extorting private companies and dropping the full weight of the government censorship hammer on First Amendment rights.”
Who was in favour of Disney/ABC’s decision to cancel Kimmel’s show?
Trump and his MAGA base celebrated Kimmel’s show going off the air.
“Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done. Kimmel has ZERO talent, and worse ratings than even Colbert, if that’s possible. That leaves Jimmy and Seth, two total losers, on Fake News NBC,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, referring to late-night show hosts Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers.
What has all this cost Disney?
Between September 17 and early on Tuesday, the value of The Walt Disney Company’s stock fell by 2.39 percent – the equivalent of $4.99bn of its market value.
Andrew Kolvet, a spokesperson for Kirk’s conservative youth organisation, Turning Point USA, posted a message on X accusing Disney and ABC of caving in to pressure.
“Disney and ABC caving and allowing Kimmel back on the air is not surprising, but it’s their mistake to make,” Kolvet wrote on Monday.
Gomez, the only Democrat on the FCC board, posted a statement on Monday, saying: “I am glad to see Disney find its courage in the face of clear government intimidation.”
Kimmel has not issued a public statement so far.
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