As many late-night talk show hosts (besides Greg Gutfeld) struggle to stay relevant, host Jimmy Kimmel recently displayed the insulated nature of his position and his stunted thinking. He tried in vain to cast blame on the right, all while being the very person he tries to claim is disappointing him regarding twisted views on censorship. It was a marvel to behold.
For the most part, the uproar over the cancellation of "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" has died down, mostly due to the arrival of facts that derailed all the emotional fervor. Colbert’s money-losing enterprise was exposed, no evidence emerged to back up claims that he was silenced by President Trump, and there is the small matter that he remains on the air until May 2026 to spew his derangement monologues.
Add to that the fact that his parent company just handed the creators of “South Park” a monster contract renewal, all while putting out some of the most vile anti-Trump content, and the mewling over Colbert being “censored” can be easily ignored.
As expected, this is still a simmering issue within the realm of late-night talk shows (where the recent incursion by Gutfeld caused more tremors as it also delivered success), and we have one of the players delivering more commentary on the matter – and in the process burying the issue at the same time.
At Variety, they sat for a lengthy interview with Jimmy Kimmel, another of the activist “comedians” plying his trade of provoking clap-ter in the graveyard shift. Kimmel spoke at length on the Colbert coup and provided a number of insights, seemingly delivered with closed eyes. Amusingly, Variety tries to cast Kimmel as some sort of industry savant. Behold this insistence in its introduction.
What was initially planned as a conversation about his Emmy nominations quickly transformed into an industry veteran’s passionate defense of late-night television and a masterclass in media economics.
Okay then. But whatever expertise I am expected to buy into regarding Kimmel is blasted into confetti when I listen to his comments about the Colbert cancellation. He tries to dissuade anyone from buying into the reports that the show loses $40 million, but does little to provide contrary evidence. He claims that the fees paid by local affiliates would counter any losses, but he only stated “a certain percentage” of those fees go towards late-night shows. No hard numbers from Jimmy were forthcoming.
The Colbert budget was rather succinct, coming from those inside CBS. He has a salary of $15 million annually and a staff of 200. The show costs an astounding $100 million to produce each year, which averages out to almost $600,000 per episode. And Kimmel even alludes to the mounting demise of late-night. “I will tell you, the first 10 years I did the show, they claimed we weren’t making any money — and we had five times as many viewers on ABC as we do now. Who knows what’s true?”
It is not clear how he can claim late-night is vibrant WHILE attesting that its audience has been eroding for a solid decade. But he really undercuts his wisdom with his claims of censorship being in play. Kimmel needs to brush aside these firm claims about “The Late Show” hemorrhaging cash because it interferes with his insistence that Colbert has been muzzled. Drink in this dose of sanctimony from Kimmel
I think we were all shocked and disappointed that this kind of thing is happening in America, and also disappointed that we don’t see more people on the right stepping up and saying, “Hey, this is no good.” Silencing comedians, commentators, whatever you want to call people… I have to say, if Joe Biden had used his muscle to get Sean Hannity kicked off the air, you may be surprised to learn that I would not support that. I would, in fact, support Sean Hannity in that situation, because I thought one of the founding principles of this country was free speech. But people don’t seem to care about protecting it unless you agree with them.
Now, two things will display how this rant is complete bovine excrement. First, along with the “South Park” windfall, no other comedians are being yanked as a result of their content. Case in point, Kimmel has been far more acerbic in the way he has been addressing Donald Trump for years, and he remains free to bellyache at the opening of each of his episodes. So his claim of the censoring of opposition comedians is made impotent by his simply appearing on camera each night.
Secondly, this puffery about him supporting those on the right if they were to be silenced is exposed as a pure lie by past events. There is a mirror image of Colbert’s dismissal that took place on the right, and Kimmel’s reaction to it was quite the opposite of his claim. There was a commentator taken off the air, and - much like it is suggested with Colbert - it seemed to stem from a lawsuit brought to a network.
Tucker Carlson was unceremoniously removed from his primetime gig, and it was rather strongly suggested that it had to do with the Dominion Voting Systems defamation suit and his subsequent comments. Tucker was not granted a lengthy exit, like Colbert, and his dismissal led to varied reactions, with some questioning and many others applauding - specifically, Jimmy Kimmel.
And this is where we have to call bullcrap on his claim.
— Brad Slager: CNN+ Lifetime Subscriber (@MartiniShark) August 19, 2025
When Tucker Carlson was cancelled - which WAS in fact over content - Kimmel's reaction to it was not exactly one of standing up for his rights and for free speech. https://t.co/wkTFEEThCv pic.twitter.com/9uBKzCty7i
Absent is Kimmel’s bold stance for free speech and our founding principles. No, instead, we see him basically dancing on the grave of a fallen commentator, in his trademark vulgar fashion.
The question now is where will he do it next?" he quipped. "Will he go to OAN (One America News), will he go to Newsmax? Will he crawl back up Satan's firey b-hole from once he came?” The comedian ended his send-off to Carlson by sharing a sizzle reel of his Fox News moments, calling him "one of the most despicable" anchors to "ever appear on American television."
Kimmel has shown he is perfectly aligned with most of the rest of Hollywood, late-night hosts, and entertainers in general, who are telling us how to behave. Listen to their lectures, swallow their bromides and directives, but don’t you dare hold them accountable for defying their own dictates.
Those rules are for us, the rabble; expecting them to comport themselves in the same fashion is completely out of line.
Editor's Note: The mainstream media continues to deflect, gaslight, spin, and lie about President Trump, his administration, and conservatives.
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