Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel declared that he would “love to have Trump” on his show – Jimmy Kimmel Live! despite their ongoing fued that has eventually suspended the show temporarily. During an appearance at a Bloomberg Screentime event in Hollywood, Kimmel spoke candidly about it. He was asked whether he would reach out to President Donald Trump or even FCC chairman Brendan Carr to appear on his show following his return to television after the brief hiatus. Kimmel revealed he hadn’t.
He stated, “I wouldn’t necessarily be interested in Brendan Carr on the show. But yeah, I’d love to have Trump on the show, for sure. I mean, I feel like he knows that if…he wants, I dunno…alright, I’ll ask him.” During mid-September, ABC and Disney removed Jimmy Kimmel Live! from airwaves concerning the comments uttered by Kimmel, that too on air, concerning the fatal shooting of conservative influencer Charlie Kirk.
The cancellation of his show took place after the media company Nexstar declared that it would stop broadcasting the program on its 32 ABC affiliate stations. Subsequently, Sinclair, a media conglomerate, followed suit with a similar decision. Carr, earlier that same day, even warned the right-wing podcaster Benny Johnson, saying, “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct and take actions on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”
During the suspension period of Jimmy Kimmel’s show, Trump rejoiced by attacking the host as “unfunny and untalented,” and also claimed that ABC had “fired” him for “poor ratings.” However, Kimmel eventually returned to television on September 22 after Disney, as well as ABC, reversed the suspension due to massive public outcry, with approximately 2 million Disney+ subscription cancellations taking place.
Kimmel also spoke to at the Bloomberg Screentime event, and disclosed that he believed his career was finished when the suspension was announced. “The idea that I would not have 40 affiliates, I was like, ‘Well, that’s it.’ Because there seemed to be a list of demands presented to me and I was not going to go along with any of them,” he revealed.
He is globally popular and is also an Emmy-winning television host, and was alluding to Sinclair’s redemption requirements, which required a public apology as well as a “substantial contribution” to Charlie Kirk’s conservative nonprofit organization. He continued saying – “So it’s was like, ‘Well, I guess we’re done.’ I said to my wife, ‘That’s it. It’s over.'”
And countering all these, Kimmel returned to the airwaves with both Nexstar and Sinclair resuming the airing of the program on their respective network stations. He also reflected on his perspective, explaining his comeback episode as something that “probably went about as good as it could go,” and he aimed to be honest and “put everything on the table” regarding “what I was feeling and what I’d experienced.”
He further stated, “And I think I did. I knew that it wasn’t going to be perfect. There were always going to be people that didn’t like it and didn’t accept it, but the important thing to me was that I was able to explain what I was saying, what I was trying to say.”
