Seth Meyers showed support for his late night comrade Jimmy Kimmel in the first episode of Late Night since news that ABC was shelving Jimmy Kimmel Live! indefinitely.
Meyers, 51, discussed ABC’s decision — which was announced on Wednesday, September 17 — during his “A Closer Look” segment on the Thursday, September 18, episode of Late Night With Seth Meyers.
Before directly addressing the move, Meyers began by poking fun at his own history with President Donald Trump.
“I just want to say before we get started here, that I’ve always admired and respected Mr. Trump,” Meyers said. “I’ve always believed he was a visionary, an innovator, a great president and even better golfer. If you’ve ever seen me say anything negative about him, that’s just AI. I’m told there’s some clips of me on the internet making jokes about him from a few years back. Those are obviously deepfakes.”
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In the wake of Kimmel being pulled from airwaves, Meyers vowed “to keep doing our show the way we’ve always done it, with enthusiasm and integrity.”
“It is a privilege and an honor to call Jimmy Kimmel my friend, in the same way that it’s a privilege and honor to do this show every night,” Meyers said. “I wake up every day and I count my blessings that I live in a country that at least purports to value freedom of speech.”
Meyers called ABC’s decision “a pivotal moment in our democracy.”
“We must all stand up for the principles of free expression,” he added. “There is a reason free speech is in the very first amendment. It stands above all others.”
Meyers also mocked Trump’s past guarantees about free speech, insisting he would “bring it back.”
“Trump promised to end government censorship and bring back free speech and he’s doing the opposite, and it has experts worried that we’re rapidly devolving into oppressive autocracy in the style of Russia or Hungary, much faster than anyone could have predicted,” Meyers argued.
ABC announced the decision to immediately remove Kimmel from their lineup on Wednesday. “Jimmy Kimmel Live will be pre-empted indefinitely,” an ABC spokesperson confirmed to Us Weekly.
The decision was made after Nexstar Media, one of the biggest owners of TV stations in the U.S., threatened to cut the show in response to Kimmel’s recent comments about the death of conservative political activist Charlie Kirk.
Kirk was shot and killed during a speaking engagement at Utah Valley University on September 10. He was 31 years old.
In a statement on Wednesday, Nexstar said that it “strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk and will replace the show with other programming in its ABC-affiliated markets.”
Kimmel discussed Kirk’s murder on the Monday, September 15, episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, which came just days after 22-year-old Tyler Robinson was taken into custody in connection to Kirk’s shooting.
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“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 with everything they can to score political points from,” Kimmel said during his monologue. “In between the finger-pointing, there was grieving.”
Kimmel also criticized Trump for his behavior in the aftermath of Kirk’s murder.
When Trump was asked how he was “holding up” after Kirk’s death, he told reporters he was doing “very good” and changed the subject to the new ballroom construction at the White House.
“This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend,” Kimmel claimed. “This is how a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish.”
