By Dawn Chmielewski and David Shepardson
LOS ANGELES, April 28 (Reuters) – A joke by talk show host Jimmy Kimmel that prompted calls from the White House for the ABC TV network to fire the comedian has triggered the first crisis facing Walt Disney’s new CEO Josh D’Amaro.
Last Thursday, Kimmel, whose late-night TV program airs on Disney’s ABC, did a send-up of the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, joking that First Lady Melania Trump had “a glow like an expectant widow.”
The joke was made three days before the actual black-tie dinner, celebrating press freedom and free speech, in Washington. The president and first lady were rushed from the dinner following an assassination attempt.
The Trumps called on Monday for ABC to fire Kimmel, the latest incident of the White House pushing back on free speech that has roiled the world of late-night comedy.
During his monologue on Monday night’s show, Kimmel said the joke had been misconstrued and was not a “call to assassination” but a comment on the age difference between Trump, who will be 80 in June, and his wife, who turned 56 this month.
Steven Cheung, an assistant to the president and White House communications director, accused Kimmel of “making a disgusting joke about assassinating the President” and “doubling down on that joke instead of doing the decent thing by apologizing,” in a post on X.
The FCC is set to order as soon as later today license reviews of the 8 Disney-owned ABC stations, a source told Reuters.
D’Amaro, who became Disney CEO in March, must decide how to respond to mounting pressure from the White House to fire Kimmel.
A Disney spokesman could not be reached for comment about Kimmel, who survived a previous call for ABC to fire him.
ABC is regulated under the Federal Communications Commission, which issues broadcast licenses to its affiliated stations. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr told Reuters last month he was considering moving up reviews, which are not scheduled until October 2028.
Carr did not immediately respond to a text message and the FCC did not immediately comment on whether it would review Kimmel’s remarks.
In September 2025, the head of the FCC pressured broadcasters to take Kimmel off the air. ABC briefly suspended Kimmel’s show that month over comments he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
Past White House Correspondents’ Dinner controversies have often centered on comedians pushing the event’s traditional roast format too far for some attendees. Late-night hosts Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers faced criticism for their stinging remarks. This year’s event was to feature mentalist Oz Pearlman, not a comedian.
Trump skipped the 2017 dinner and held a rally instead. Comedian Michelle Wolf’s 2018 routine, especially jokes involving Sarah Huckabee Sanders, triggered backlash — and in 2019 the association dropped the roast format in favor of historian Ron Chernow.
(Reporting by Dawn Chmielewski in Los Angeles and David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by David Gregorio)
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