Here we go again.
Seven months after Disney-owned ABC pulled “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” off the air because of a joke about right-wing reactions to the murder of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, the Federal Communications Commission is now targeting ABC on the heels of another Kimmel joke.
The FCC directed Disney to file early license renewals for its owned and operated ABC stations by May 28; the stations were not due for renewals until anywhere between 2028 and 2031, per NBCNews.com.
WTAE, ABC’s Pittsburgh affiliate, is owned by Hearst, not ABC, so it’s not involved in this dispute.
The FCC’s request is ostensibly related to an ongoing investigation into Disney’s diversity initiatives, but the move comes the day after both President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump called on ABC to fire Kimmel.
As in September, a willful misinterpretation of Kimmel’s joke is at play. Just as the September 2025 joke was not about Kirk’s murder but the reactions to it, last week’s joke was not about the assassination attempt on President Donald Trump that occurred two days after Kimmel’s bit about what a comedian might say on stage at this year’s White House Correspondents’ dinner.
“Of course, our first lady, Melania, is here,” Kimmel said on Thursday night, two days before the shooting at the actual WHCD. Then, pretending to speak to the First Lady, he added: “Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow,” a joke about Trump’s age and the supposition that there’s no love lost between Melania Trump and her husband.
At the time the joke was initially broadcast, there was no uproar. Only after Saturday’s attempt on Trump’s life did both Trumps issue statements demanding Kimmel be fired.
“His monologue about my family isn’t comedy,” Melania Trump wrote in a statement. “His words are corrosive and deepens the political sickness within America.” She called Mr. Kimmel “a coward” who “shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate.” She said he “hides behind ABC because he knows the network will keep running cover to protect him.”
A few hours later on Monday, President Trump described Kimmel’s joke as “something far beyond the pale,” before declaring, “Jimmy Kimmel should be immediately fired by Disney and ABC.”
CNN reported the FCC had not filed an early renewal order, as it did with ABC Tuesday, in many years.
“This weapon certainly hasn’t been deployed against a major broadcaster in many decades,” public interest lawyer Andrew Jay Schwartzman told CNN. “The legal standard for denying a license renewal is almost insurmountable. … A hearing and subsequent judicial review would take years, during which time the broadcaster can continue to operate as normal.”
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez, a Democratic appointee, decried her agency’s action.
“This is the most egregious action this FCC has taken in violation of the First Amendment to date,” Gomez said in a statement. “As part of its ongoing campaign of censorship and control, the White House called publicly for the silencing of a vocal critic, and this FCC has now answered that call.
“This is an unprecedented and politically motivated attempt to interfere with how broadcasters operate, and this unlawful overreach will fail,” she continued. “This should be a lesson to media companies that no amount of capitulation to this Administration will buy them protection. The only choice is to stand up and stand firm in defense of the First Amendment.”
Clayton Weimers, executive director of Reporters Without Borders, issued a statement echoing Gomez’s assertion.
“The FCC’s unconstitutional threats against ABC are the latest confirmation that Chairman Brendan Carr has weaponized what should be an independent agency in service of Donald Trump’s personal political agenda,” Weimers wrote. “The FCC has no authority to revoke ABC’s licenses just because the president can’t take a joke. It is reassuring that Disney, ABC’s parent company, has already signaled that they are prepared to fight this illegal overreach. They must call Carr’s bluff. Now Congress needs to step up to rein in an out-of-control FCC.”
The Hollywood Reporter notes that unlike last time, so far ABC affiliates and advertisers have not offered public reactions. And ABC has not pulled Kimmel’s show from the air.
On his show Monday night, Kimmel did not apologize for the latest joke to get him in hot water with the Trumps, saying that his remark was not a call for violence but rather “a joke about their age difference and the look of joy we see on her face every time they’re together.
“It was a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80, and she’s younger than I am,” Kimmel continued. “It was not, by any stretch of the definition, a call to assassination, and they know that.”