Jimmy Kimmel kept the saga surrounding his show’s brief suspension alive Monday night by taking a shot at JD Vance.
On Friday the vice-president told Fox News that the program was cut ‘because advertisers don’t like him because his ratings aren’t very good’.
After playing back the clip, Kimmel dismissed Vance’s claim as ‘bullsh*t’.
He then boasted about the show being available to ‘100 percent of the country’, following the decision by television giants Sinclair and Nexstar to return his show to their affiliates late last week despite his comments about the alleged killer of Charlie Kirk.
The number was at around 75 percent before, as a total of 70 ABC affiliates abstained from the host’s anticipated TV return.
For ABC and its more than 200 local-level stations, the return occurred on September 23. Despite some holdouts, the episode garnered high ratings, attracting 6.5 million total viewers.
By Thursday, though, nearly two-thirds of that audience had largely evaporated, leaving Kimmel with 2.3million total viewers.
On Friday, Fox News host Laura Ingraham had observed how celebrities were rallying behind Kimmel just before he was brought back on the air.
Jimmy Kimmel addressed his show’s brief suspension again Monday night during his opening monologue
Vance informed Fox News on Friday that Kimmel’s show was cut ‘because advertisers don’t favor him due to his poor ratings’. Kimmel dismissed Vance’s statement as ‘absurd’.
‘I’d like them to explain exactly what [Federal Communications Commissioner Chairman] Brendan Carr did to have Jimmy Kimmel removed from the air because, first of all, he is currently broadcasting,’ Vance retorted, downplaying the administration’s involvement in the ongoing issue.
‘And to the extent that he isn’t in certain stations, it’s because he’s not funny and because his ratings aren’t very good.’
Kimmel, in response, joked: ‘Vice-President Maybelline was making the rounds, trying to defend his boss and the chairman of the FCC with a new fairy tale that even a five-year-old wouldn’t believe.’
‘I have some good news for you, J Dog,’ he added, taking yet another victory lap.
‘We’re back on all the stations at every home, every bar, every strip club and every prison in America,’ he said.
‘My ratings aren’t very good!? Last time I checked, your ratings are somewhere between a hair in your salad and chlamydia.’
The comments came exactly two weeks after the monologue that got the host in hot water to begin with.
He criticized ‘the MAGA gang’ for ‘frantically attempting to portray’ the suspect in the assassination of Charlie Kirk ‘as anything other than one of them and doing everything possible to gain political advantage from it.’
He then bragged about the show being broadcast to ‘100 percent of the country’, following television giants Sinclair (whose Maryland HQ is seen here) and Nexstar’s decision to return his show to its affiliates last week
President Trump attacked and threatened to sue ABC last week for allowing Kimmel back on the air. He also claimed the show was canned because of bad ratings
Kirk was killed on September 10 while speaking at a college campus in southern Utah.
The host also played a clip of Donald Trump answering a question about how he was coping with the youth activist’s death to poke fun at the president’s mourning process.
He was reprimanded two days later by Carr, who during a conversation with conservative podcaster Benny Johnson, urged affiliates to push back on ABC and Disney.
The FCC boss claimed he was considering an investigation into ABC over Kimmel’s comments.
Within hours, both Sinclair and Nexstar told Disney they would not air Kimmel’s show. Disney, that day, decided to pull the show completely.
The decision sparked protests and an attack on ABC affiliate ABC10 (KXTV) that saw three shots fired into the station in Sacramento. The FBI has since arrested a suspect in the case. No one was injured.
Disney then made the call to ‘return’ the show this past Tuesday.
During his first night back, Kimmel bashed Trump for relishing in his four-episode cancellation.
In that instance, he played a similar clip of the president telling reporters the host was ‘a wack job’ with ‘no ratings.’
Kimmel also mocked Vance’s attempts to downplay FCC chairman Brendan Carr’s role in the saga. Hours before Disney suspended the show, Carr told podcaster Benny Johnson that he was considering a probe into ABC. He urged affiliates to push back on the network and Disney
Kimmel is seen here before his first day back on Jimmy Kimmel Live! last Tuesday, which was met with high ratings. The spike largely subsided after two days
‘Well, I do tonight,’ Kimmel quipped, in a reference to his short-lived ratings rush.
Like other legacy media-run late night shows, ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ has also seen its audience dwindle over the past decade.
Previously, the program averaged 2.4million viewers in 2015.
Today, the average is around 1.6million – second only to soon-to-be cancelled Stephen Colbert. NBC’s Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers account for third and fourth, respectively.
