Saturday, September 20, 2025

Kimmel in Context



As we all know

ABC has pulled late-night host Jimmy Kimmel off air indefinitely over comments he made about the shooting of right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk.

"Jimmy Kimmel Live will be pre-empted indefinitely," a spokesperson for the Disney-owned network said in a statement to the BBC.

In his Monday night monologue, Kimmel said the "MAGA gang" was trying to score political points off Kirk's killing.

On Tuesday, a 22-year-old suspect appeared in court charged with aggravated murder over last Wednesday's shooting of the 31-year-old conservative activist. Representatives for Kimmel did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Kimmel said on Monday: "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."

Kimmel was making two assertions: 1) the "kid who murdered Charlie Kirk is "one of them," the "Maga Gang"; and 2) the MAGA Gang is "doing everything they can to score political points from it."

The talk-show host was wrong about the first. As of late Monday when he made his remark, we knew only that alleged murderer Tyler Robinson hated Charlie Kirk, which was rather obvious from the start. Since then, we have learned that Robinson was incensed at the "hate" he believed the victim was spreading and, very likely, had become more keen on gay and transgender rights, which would have put him very much in odds with Kirk.

Jimmy Kimmel wasn't alone in being wrong about Charlie Kirk's assassin, and the evidence points to his accuracy in the contention that the far right is "doing everything they can to score political points from it." As The Guardian reports

Trump allies have sought to link Kirk’s killing – without evidence – to what they say is a coordinated leftwing “terror” movement that supports political violence, funded by progressive and liberal charities. This has led to fears of a draconian crackdown on free speech. 

One of them is the junior Senator from the state of Kansas:


Don't wait for the evidence- blame it on the left:

Prior to that, the actual Vice President of the USA, not a talk show host, had

guest-hosted Kirk’s podcast on Monday and said that people who “see someone celebrating Charlie’s murder” should “call them out”. He added: “Hell, call their employer. We don’t believe in political violence, but we do believe in civility, and there is no civility in the celebration of political assassination.”

Monkey say, monkey do. From the Oval Office only a few hours after Kirk was killed, President Trump issued a video message in which he alleged

Radical left political violence has hurt too many innocent people and taken too many lives. Tonight, I ask all Americans to commit themselves tot he American values for which Charlie Kirk lived and died.

The body was barely cold and we didn't know who the assailant was- let alone his motive- and Donald already had declared that the "radical left" had committed the murder. And in his response to the murder of Kirk and erasing any thought of Donald, House Speaker Mike Johnson stated on Fox News Sunday

People have got to stop framing simple policy disagreements in terms of existential threats to our democracy. You can't call the other side fascists and enemies of the state and not understand that there are some deranged people in our society who will take that as cues to act.

Donald Trump has called the press the "enemy of the people"' called Kamala Harris during the last presidential campaign a "fascist;" and his political enemies "communists, Marxists, fascists" and "radical left thugs that live like vermin."  (Certainly nothing that will encourage "deranged people" to act out their grievances.)

So blaming the left for the assassination of the famous podcaster and activist is not only dangerous in itself, but is coupled with an effort by Donald Trump, daddy to Republican officials, to erase and rewrite history. Oh, but Jimmy Kimmel inaccurately implied that Tyler Robinson was a supporter of the MAGA movement and must be cancelled.



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