🔥 KIMMEL TAKES DIRECT AIM AT TRUMP — HIS “THE WORLD IS LAUGHING AT HIM” REMARK JUST BLEW THE FEUD WIDE OPEN… |
TRUMP VS. JIMMY KIMMEL: A DECADE OF LATE-NIGHT WAR HAS TURNED INTO A REAL FCC AND FIRST AMENDMENT FIGHT
ad-free version here: For more than a decade, Jimmy Kimmel and Donald Trump have traded insults in public — first as a television host needling a celebrity businessman, later as one of late night's most relentless presidential critics battling a president who attacks his talent, ratings and employer by name.
The feud is real, personal and unusually durable. Kimmel has mocked Trump's politics, appearance, age, legal troubles, rhetoric and fixation on television ratings. Trump has repeatedly called Kimmel untalented, attacked his audience numbers, demanded that ABC fire him and celebrated when his show was temporarily suspended.
But describing the story only as a celebrity rivalry now understates what has happened.
Since 2025, the Trump-Kimmel conflict has become entangled with federal broadcast regulation, ABC affiliate decisions and a major First Amendment lawsuit. Disney and ABC are currently suing the Federal Communications Commission over an extraordinary early review of eight Disney-owned local ABC station licenses. The companies say the review is retaliation for programming that angered Trump, including Kimmel's comedy. The FCC denies that charge.
On September 3, 2026, the FCC asked a federal judge to dismiss Disney's lawsuit. A hearing is scheduled for October 6. That means a feud that once consisted of monologue jokes and social-media insults is now part of an active federal court battle over the limits of government pressure on broadcasters.
The president does not personally control ABC's broadcast licenses. Local broadcast stations are licensed by the FCC, and the current legal dispute concerns eight Disney-owned ABC stations — not a single national 'ABC license.'
The Relationship Was Not Always Openly Hostile
The Trump-Kimmel story predates Trump's presidency and was not hostile from the beginning.
Kimmel's show was already mocking Trump's political rise in 2015, including a segment by sidekick Guillermo Rodriguez responding to Trump's rhetoric about Mexico. When Trump canceled a scheduled October 2015 appearance, Kimmel joked about the last-minute withdrawal.
Trump nevertheless appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live in December 2015 during the Republican primary campaign. Kimmel questioned him about his proposed temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States, but the interview also included lighter material about sports, Star Wars and a mock children's book.
Trump returned in May 2016 after becoming the presumptive Republican nominee. Kimmel pressed him on his previous praise for Hillary Clinton and other inconsistencies, but the exchange still had the tone of a combative late-night interview rather than an entrenched personal war.
The relationship hardened as Trump's candidacy became the defining subject of American political comedy.
Kimmel Became a Much More Political Host During Trump's First Term
By 2017, Kimmel was no longer treating Trump primarily as an entertainment figure.
He used his monologues to attack Republican healthcare legislation, gun policy and Trump administration decisions, often mixing policy arguments with highly personal comedy.
Trump, in turn, complained that late-night television was overwhelmingly anti-Republican and questioned why networks gave comedians who attacked him so much airtime.
The conflict increasingly centered on two subjects Trump has followed for decades: television popularity and personal criticism.
The Oscars Became One of Their Favorite Battlegrounds
The feud repeatedly spilled onto the Academy Awards stage.
Kimmel hosted the Oscars in 2017 and joked about Trump during the broadcast. Trump later criticized the ceremony as overly political and lacking glamour after the notorious Best Picture envelope mistake.
The following year, Trump mocked the Oscars after the telecast fell to what was then a record-low audience. Kimmel answered by calling Trump the lowest-rated president in history and joked on his show that he had gotten under Trump's skin.
The exchange captured a pattern that would recur for years: Trump used ratings as evidence that a critic was failing; Kimmel responded by making Trump's obsession with ratings part of the joke.
The 2024 Oscars Produced Their Most Famous Live Exchange
The rivalry reached an especially visible moment at the March 2024 Academy Awards.
While Kimmel was hosting, Trump posted a scathing Truth Social review asking whether there had ever been a worse Oscars host and calling the show boring, disjointed and unfair.
Kimmel read part of Trump's post live from the Oscars stage shortly before Best Picture was announced.
He then thanked Trump for watching and delivered a jab about Trump's pending criminal cases: 'Isn't it past your jail time?'
Kimmel later said producers backstage had advised him not to read Trump's post, but he insisted on doing it.
That moment reinforced the public perception that each man was monitoring the other in real time — and that both understood the feud's entertainment value.
Kimmel's attacks are comedy and political commentary, not neutral reporting. Trump's responses are political rhetoric and personal criticism, not objective measures of Kimmel's talent or legitimacy.
The 2025 Suspension Changed the Stakes
The dispute became much more serious in September 2025 after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
Kimmel criticized what he described as efforts by 'MAGA' figures to politically capitalize on the killing and suggested that people in Trump's movement were trying to characterize the accused killer as anything other than one of them.
That framing drew heavy criticism because investigators said the suspect had moved politically left and had targeted Kirk over hostility toward his views.
Nexstar, which operates dozens of ABC affiliates, announced that its stations would preempt Kimmel's program. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr also condemned the comments and said companies could address the situation 'the easy way or the hard way,' warning of additional FCC work if they did not act.
ABC then suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live indefinitely. Trump celebrated the decision and praised ABC for finally doing what he believed needed to be done.
Kimmel's Kirk remarks were legitimately subject to criticism, and ABC was legally free as a private employer to discipline its host. The separate constitutional controversy concerned whether federal regulatory pressure influenced that private decision.
Kimmel Returned — and the Audience Spiked
ABC restored Kimmel to the air roughly a week later after what the company described as discussions with the host.
Kimmel said he had not intended to make light of Kirk's assassination and paid tribute to Kirk's widow, but he did not deliver the full apology critics had demanded.
Trump immediately attacked ABC for bringing him back and again threatened legal consequences.
The return episode drew nearly 6.3 million television viewers according to ABC — far above the roughly 1.8 million nightly audience AP reported as typical for the program at the time — even though some major affiliate groups initially continued to preempt the show.
The episode illustrated a paradox in Trump's feud with Kimmel: attacks on the host have sometimes generated the kind of massive attention that ordinary late-night television rarely receives anymore.
April 2026 Brought Another 'Fire Kimmel' Demand
The conflict erupted again in April 2026 over a joke involving First Lady Melania Trump.
In a mock White House correspondents' dinner monologue broadcast on April 23, Kimmel joked that the first lady had 'a glow like an expectant widow.'
Two days later, a shooting disrupted the actual White House Correspondents' Association dinner. After the shooting, the earlier Kimmel joke circulated online as if it had been a threat connected to the attack.
The chronology is important: Kimmel made the joke before the shooting occurred.
Kimmel later said the line was an age-gap joke about the nearly 80-year-old president and his younger wife and denied that it was a call for assassination.
Trump nevertheless called the joke a despicable call to violence and demanded that Disney and ABC immediately fire Kimmel. Melania Trump separately criticized the host and called on ABC to act.
It is inaccurate to describe the 'expectant widow' joke as something Kimmel said after the April shooting. The joke aired two days before the attack.
The FCC Moved One Day After Trump's Firing Demand
The next development is what transformed the controversy from another entertainment feud into a constitutional and regulatory fight.
On April 28, one day after Trump publicly demanded Kimmel's firing, the FCC directed Disney to submit early license-renewal applications for eight company-owned ABC broadcast stations.
Those station licenses were not ordinarily due for renewal until between 2028 and 2031.
Reuters reported that the FCC had not conducted this type of early license review in more than 50 years before the actions taken in April.
Democratic senators accused FCC Chairman Carr of using federal licensing authority to punish Disney for refusing to fire a Trump critic. Carr and the FCC rejected the claim that the review was an attempt to censor ABC or retaliate for Kimmel's speech.
Trump Said ABC Was Putting Itself in 'Great Jeopardy'
Two days after the early-review order, Trump intensified the pressure publicly.
In an April 30 Newsmax interview, he said he did not understand how Kimmel could still be on the air and said ABC was putting itself in 'great jeopardy' by keeping him.
The statement did not itself revoke a license or constitute an FCC order.
But because the FCC had just initiated an extraordinary review of Disney's stations, the president's language became part of a larger debate over whether presidential criticism and regulatory action were operating in tandem.
Disney and ABC Eventually Sued the FCC
In August 2026, Disney and ABC filed a federal lawsuit seeking to stop the early license review.
Their complaint argues that the FCC has mounted a retaliatory campaign against a network that refused to change programming to satisfy the Trump administration.
ABC says the pressure has already affected editorial choices and created fear that ordinary programming decisions could provoke regulatory punishment.
The companies point to Trump's repeated calls for ABC stations to lose licenses and to his demands that Kimmel be removed as part of the alleged pattern.
FCC Chairman Carr denies that the agency is infringing on Disney's free-speech rights. He says broadcasters receive valuable use of the public airwaves and can be required to satisfy the public-interest obligations attached to those licenses.
Disney's claim that the FCC review is political retaliation is an allegation in active litigation. The FCC disputes it, and no court has yet entered a final merits ruling establishing that the agency retaliated against ABC because of Kimmel.
The Latest Development Came This Week
The legal fight is still active as of September 5, 2026.
On September 3, the FCC asked U.S. District Judge Loren AliKhan to dismiss Disney's lawsuit.
The agency argues, among other things, that Disney is trying to block an ongoing investigation and that the dispute belongs in the federal appeals court rather than the district court.
The FCC says the review includes allegations that Disney engaged in unlawful discrimination and maintains that it has not yet decided whether to refer the stations' licenses for a formal hearing.
Judge AliKhan has scheduled an October 6 hearing. The FCC has agreed to provide at least 48 hours' notice before taking a step to refer Disney's ABC licenses for a public hearing.
That is the current status — not a completed Trump victory, not a final vindication for Disney and not an actual revocation of ABC stations' licenses.
The First Amendment Issue Requires an Important Distinction
A president is free to criticize a comedian, call a television show terrible and urge a private company to fire an employee.
ABC likewise has its own editorial and employment rights and may decide what programming it wants to air, subject to applicable law and contractual obligations.
The constitutional issue becomes much more serious when critics allege that the government is using regulatory power to coerce a broadcaster into changing protected speech.
The First Amendment restricts government action. It does not ordinarily guarantee a television host a private-sector job.
Disney's case therefore turns not on whether Kimmel is funny or whether his jokes are offensive, but on whether the FCC's licensing actions amount to unlawful government retaliation or coercion.
Trump's Critics Also Overstate the Case When They Say He Personally 'Canceled' Kimmel
Kimmel was suspended by ABC in September 2025. Trump praised the suspension, and FCC Chairman Carr had made regulatory comments before the network acted.
That sequence is why the episode generated serious free-speech concerns.
But Trump did not personally sign an order removing Kimmel from television, and the FCC did not formally revoke a station license over the comedian.
ABC made the suspension decision and then reversed it.
The more precise question — now part of active litigation — is whether government pressure improperly influenced private media decisions.
Kimmel Has Never Pretended to Be Politically Neutral
Kimmel's critics are correct about one basic point: his Trump material is not neutral comedy.
For years, he has been an outspoken Trump opponent and has used his platform for arguments on healthcare, guns, immigration, abortion, democratic institutions and other political issues.
His monologues frequently mix jokes with direct political advocacy and moral condemnation.
Viewers who believe late-night television has become ideologically one-sided therefore have a legitimate cultural and media criticism to make.
That criticism, however, is different from the legal question of whether the federal government may use licensing power to punish a broadcaster for carrying speech that angers the president.
Trump Has Made Ratings and Talent Part of the Feud for Years
Trump repeatedly calls Kimmel untalented and points to late-night ratings as evidence that audiences reject him.
Kimmel has responded by mocking Trump's fixation on television numbers and by noting occasions when anti-Trump controversy increased his own audience.
Ratings comparisons require caution because the late-night business has changed dramatically with streaming, online clips and declining linear television audiences.
The September 2025 return episode is a good example: its television audience was unusually large, while millions more watched the monologue through social platforms.
Neither a single low-rated episode nor a viral spike proves who is politically 'winning' the feud.
A Decade-Long Rivalry Is Fair — but 'Deeply Personal' Should Be Used Carefully
Calling the feud decade-long is reasonable. Kimmel was mocking Trump during the 2015 campaign, Trump appeared on the program that year and the exchanges became increasingly hostile after the 2016 election.
Calling it personal is also fair in the ordinary sense that both men repeatedly attack each other's character, competence and public image.
But claims about Trump's 'insecurities' or Kimmel's private motives move from observable fact into psychological interpretation.
The public record can establish what they said, what they did and how institutions responded. It cannot prove what either man privately feels.
What Can Actually Be Said With Confidence
Jimmy Kimmel and Donald Trump have been publicly sparring since Trump's first presidential campaign, making the conflict approximately a decade old.
Their relationship was not always openly hostile: Trump appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live in December 2015 and again in May 2016.
Kimmel became an increasingly aggressive Trump critic during Trump's first term and has repeatedly mocked both his policies and personal image.
Trump has repeatedly attacked Kimmel's talent and ratings, demanded that ABC remove him and criticized the network for keeping him on the air.
At the 2024 Oscars, Trump attacked Kimmel on Truth Social during the broadcast and Kimmel read the attack from the stage before responding with a joke about Trump's criminal cases.
ABC suspended Kimmel in September 2025 after controversial remarks about Charlie Kirk's killing. The suspension came after major affiliates said they would preempt the program and after FCC Chairman Brendan Carr warned of potential regulatory consequences.
ABC restored Kimmel roughly a week later. His return drew an unusually large television and online audience.
In April 2026, Trump demanded Kimmel be fired over an 'expectant widow' joke involving Melania Trump. The joke had aired before — not after — a subsequent shooting at the White House correspondents' dinner.
One day after Trump's firing demand, the FCC ordered early license-renewal reviews for eight Disney-owned ABC stations. The licenses were not otherwise due for years, and Reuters reported that such early reviews had not been used in more than half a century before April.
Disney and ABC sued the FCC in August, alleging unconstitutional retaliation and coercion. The FCC denies retaliating and says it is carrying out lawful public-interest oversight.
On September 3, the FCC asked a federal judge to dismiss Disney's lawsuit. A hearing is scheduled for October 6.
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No ABC station has had its license revoked over Jimmy Kimmel, and no court has yet entered a final ruling that the FCC retaliated against Disney because of his speech.
The strongest accurate version of the story is therefore bigger than a simple celebrity feud: Trump and Kimmel have spent roughly a decade attacking one another, but their conflict has now become part of a live legal test over how far a president and federal regulators may go when a broadcaster carries political speech they dislike.
