ABC announces Jimmy Kimmel's show will return Tuesday

ABC announced on Monday that Jimmy Kimmel's show will return to air on Tuesday, nearly a week after the network took the program off because of backlash over the host's comments on Charlie Kirk.

The network pulled the show last Wednesday after condemning Kimmel's monologue in which he claimed President Donald Trump's "MAGA gang" was trying to politically benefit from the murder of Kirk.

“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang trying to characterize this kid who killed Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them,” Kimmel said during the monologue.

ABC said that it has spent the past week having conversations with Kimmel about his recent comments and has decided to bring the show back on air, effective Tuesday, NBC News reported.

“Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country,” Disney, which owns ABC, said in a statement. “It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive.

“We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday,” it added.

The decision comes after the network faced heavy backlash over concern that the Trump administration had censored Kimmel. Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr had threatened to revoke ABC affiliate licenses over Kimmel’s comments. 

A group of over 400 celebrities wrote in a letter to the network on Monday that the decision to remove Kimmel constituted a “dark moment for freedom of speech in our nation.” It was signed by celebrities like Jennifer Aniston, Jason Bateman, Robert De Niro, Jane Fonda, Selena Gomez, Tom Hanks, Meryl Streep and Lin-Manuel Miranda.

“We the people must never accept government threats to our freedom of speech,” the letter says. “Efforts by leaders to pressure artists, journalists, and companies with retaliation for their speech strike at the heart of what it means to live in a free country.”

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.