On the night of September 10, 2025, Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at a Utah university. Jimmy Kimmel said nothing on air. He posted condolences on Instagram and went home.
Five days later, one line in a late-night monologue cost him his show, put a federal regulator on record threatening his employer, and turned a comedy segment into a congressional matter that was still being debated six months later.
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On September 15, 2025, Kimmel said on Jimmy Kimmel Live! that “the MAGA gang” was “desperately trying to characterize” Charlie Kirk’s suspected killer “as anything other than one of them.” The comment led ABC to suspend his show indefinitely after FCC Chair Brendan Carr publicly threatened the broadcaster. Kimmel returned six days later to 6.26 million viewers, the largest regular audience in the show’s history.
The Assassination: What Happened at Utah Valley University
Charlie Kirk, 31, founder of Turning Point USA and one of President Trump’s most prominent conservative allies, was speaking at an outdoor event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, on September 10, 2025, as part of his “American Comeback Tour.” A gunman on a nearby rooftop fired a single bullet from roughly 130 metres away. Kirk was struck in the neck and pronounced dead at a local hospital. Around 3,000 people were in the audience when it happened.
Tyler James Robinson, 22, of Washington, Utah, surrendered to law enforcement the following day after his parents recognised him from FBI surveillance images. Utah prosecutors charged Robinson with aggravated murder on September 16 and announced they would seek the death penalty.
Before any charging documents or established motive were made public, President Trump declared the shooter a “radical leftist.” That framing was saturating the news cycle when Kimmel sat down in front of his cameras five days later.
What Kimmel Said First: September 11
The night after the assassination, Kimmel addressed it on air. His language was measured and aimed at no single side.
“I’ve seen a lot of extraordinarily vile responses to this from both sides of the political spectrum. Some people are cheering this, which is something I won’t ever understand.”
Jimmy Kimmel • Jimmy Kimmel Live! • September 11, 2025
He called the killing “monstrous,” condemned those celebrating it from anywhere on the political spectrum, and criticised Trump for making no visible attempt to unify the country. That episode attracted little backlash. What he said four nights later was a different matter.
The September 15 Monologue: What Kimmel Said About Charlie Kirk’s Killer
On September 15, Kimmel’s opening monologue covered Kirk’s assassination in two parts. The second part mocked Trump’s apparently indifferent response to a reporter asking how he was personally coping with Kirk’s death. Trump had replied by pointing to White House construction trucks outside. Kimmel said: “Yes, he’s at the fourth stage of grief: construction. This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend.” The room laughed.
The first part did not land the same way. Kimmel said:
“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.”
Jimmy Kimmel • Jimmy Kimmel Live! • September 15, 2025
What Kimmel was describing: conservatives working to distance Robinson from their own movement while using Kirk’s death for partisan purposes.
What right-wing media and a significant portion of viewers took it to mean: that Robinson was a Trump supporter — a factual claim with no established basis on September 15.
That distinction drove the entire controversy. Utah prosecutors had not yet released Robinson’s charging documents when Kimmel spoke. Those documents, made public the following day, would describe how Robinson had drifted leftward in recent years, had a romantic partner undergoing a gender transition, and sent a text message after the shooting that read: “I had enough of his hatred. Some hate can’t be negotiated out.” None of that was available to Kimmel, or to anyone outside law enforcement, on the night he taped.
The Hollywood Reporter’s editor-at-large James Hibberd later wrote that the remark’s “clunky wording” converted it from what Kimmel actually said “into the inflammatory conclusion that has been widely reached.”
FCC Chair Brendan Carr offered a sharper read. He told CNBC: “The issue that arose here, where lots and lots of people were upset, was not a joke. It was appearing to directly mislead the American public about one of the most significant political events we’ve had in a long time.”
September 16: He Kept Going
The following night, one day before the suspension was announced, Kimmel returned to the subject. This time:
“Many in MAGA-land are working very hard to capitalize on the murder of Charlie Kirk.”
Jimmy Kimmel • Jimmy Kimmel Live! • September 16, 2025
He also targeted Vice President JD Vance, who had appeared on The Charlie Kirk Show that same day to blame the left for the assassination, and criticised Eric Trump by name. Two nights of monologues on the same subject gave the Trump administration and conservative media a sustained record to work with rather than a single isolated comment.
Why ABC Suspended Jimmy Kimmel
On September 17, FCC Chair Brendan Carr appeared on a podcast hosted by conservative commentator Benny Johnson. He called Kimmel’s remarks “the sickest conduct possible” and issued a direct warning to the broadcasters carrying the programme:
“We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct, to take action on Kimmel or, you know, there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”
FCC Chair Brendan Carr • Benny Johnson Podcast • September 17, 2025
Within hours, Nexstar Media Group, which operates 32 ABC affiliate stations, announced it was pulling Jimmy Kimmel Live! from its schedule. Sinclair Broadcast Group, which operates 38 ABC affiliates, followed.
The context behind those decisions: Nexstar was actively seeking FCC approval for a $6.2 billion merger with Tegna when it pulled Kimmel’s show. Sinclair had also bid for Tegna. Both companies had major regulatory business pending before the same federal agency whose chairman had just publicly threatened them.
ABC announced that evening: “Jimmy Kimmel Live will be preempted indefinitely.”
Kimmel was ready to tape. He had written a monologue described internally as “very hot” that would have addressed the conservative backlash directly. Disney executives called before the cameras rolled. He took the call from his bathroom, the only private space available with five writers in his office. Jimmy Kimmel Live! had generated $76.6 million in advertising revenue for ABC in 2024, according to tracking firm iSpot.tv. It now had no national distribution.
The Reactions
Senator Ted Cruz, long one of Kimmel’s targets, said Carr’s threat was “right out of Goodfellas — right out of a mafioso coming into a bar going, ‘Nice bar you have here; it’d be a shame if something happened to it.'”
Former President Barack Obama wrote on X: “This is precisely the kind of government coercion that the First Amendment was designed to prevent. Media companies need to start standing up rather than capitulating to it.”
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez told CNN that Kimmel “did not make any unfounded claims” and that the suspension set “a dangerous new precedent” that “companies must stand firm against.”
From the other direction:
- Megyn Kelly said Kimmel had “falsely stated as a fact that Charlie Kirk’s killer was MAGA, smearing an entire movement.”
- Sinclair demanded a personal apology, a financial donation to the Kirk family and Turning Point USA, and said the show would not return to its stations until “appropriate steps” were taken.
- Trump celebrated from the UK, where he was on a state visit, posting on Truth Social to congratulate ABC “for finally having the courage to do what had to be done.”
Protests broke out outside Disney’s Burbank headquarters, along Hollywood Boulevard, and outside Disneyland in Anaheim, California. Republican senators Mitch McConnell, Rand Paul, Thom Tillis, Lisa Murkowski, and Cruz all publicly criticised Carr’s conduct, warning it set a precedent a future Democratic FCC chair could use against conservative broadcasters.
What Kimmel Said When He Returned
Six days after the suspension, Jimmy Kimmel Live! returned on September 23, 2025, to numbers the show had never seen before.
| Metric | Figure |
|---|---|
| Television viewers | 6.26 million |
| Social media views of the monologue | 26 million |
| YouTube views within 24 hours | 15.3 million |
| Normal nightly audience | ~1.77 million |
Kimmel opened by referencing Jack Paar, who staged a walkout from The Tonight Show in 1960 after NBC censors cut one of his jokes, repeating Paar’s exact return line: “As I was saying before I was interrupted.”
He did not apologise. He clarified:
“It was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man. I don’t think there’s anything funny about it. Nor was it my intention to blame any specific group for the actions of what was obviously a deeply disturbed individual. That was really the opposite of the point I was trying to make. But I understand that to some, it felt either ill-timed or unclear, or maybe both. And for those who think I did point a finger, I get why you’re upset.”
Jimmy Kimmel • Jimmy Kimmel Live! • September 23, 2025
He praised Erika Kirk, Charlie Kirk’s widow, who had publicly forgiven Robinson at his memorial service in Glendale, Arizona, two days earlier, speaking before 90,000 people. Kimmel said her words were “an example we should follow.” He was not the only prominent figure moved by them — Rob Reiner said something strikingly similar in a Piers Morgan interview recorded three days later.
Actor Robert De Niro appeared via video as a mob-boss FCC chairman, a direct callback to Cruz’s Goodfellas comparison. That night, Trump posted on Truth Social: “Let’s see how we do. Last time I went after them, they gave me $16 million dollars.”
Turning Point USA spokesperson Andrew Kolvet posted that the monologue was “not good enough.” Comic Ben Stiller called it “brilliant.”
Where Things Stand in April 2026
Robinson’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for May 18, 2026. A March 2026 ATF ballistics report could not conclusively match the bullet recovered from Kirk’s autopsy to the rifle found near the scene. Prosecutors point to Robinson’s DNA on the weapon, the fired cartridge casing, and two unfired cartridges. He has not entered a plea.
FCC Chair Brendan Carr was called before the Senate Commerce Committee in December 2025 to answer for his comments. He was questioned again at a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing in January 2026.
In December 2025, Kimmel signed a one-year contract extension with ABC, keeping Jimmy Kimmel Live! on air through May 2027. His previous extensions had each run three years. Deadline reported it will likely be his last. He told Stephen Colbert what went through his mind the night ABC called:
“I thought it’s over. I was like, ‘I’m never coming back on the air.’”
Jimmy Kimmel • The Late Show with Stephen Colbert • 2025
He was wrong about that. Whether May 2027 changes the answer is a different question.
Sources: CNN, NPR, PBS NewsHour, CBS News, Variety, Deadline, The Hollywood Reporter, CNBC, CBC News, Al Jazeera, Washington Post, The Dispatch, Courthouse News Service, Deseret News, Fox News, Bloomberg, ABC News, Wikipedia.
