Jimmy Kimmel Live! barely survived September 2025, when the outrage machine called for Kimmel’s head over a monologue joke he made in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s murder. The joke (an observation, really) was not about Kirk or his assassination, it was about MAGA Republicans scrambling to point their fingers at Democrat rhetoric as the motive behind the shooting.
This time, following Kimmel’s viral “expectant widow’ joke toward first lady Melania Trump, such an uproar has not happened — not beyond social media, anyway. Or if it has, it has yet to be raised to Disney’s highest levels by the folks who matter most: station owners and advertisers.
Last fall, FCC chair Brendan Carr amplified social media backlash to Kimmel’s quip on conservative pundit Benny Johnson’s podcast. Almost immediately, ABC station owners began calling Disney senior management with the same take(s).
“We hit some
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