U.S. Capitol insurrection, inspired by Trump
Donald Trump complains that comedian Jimmy Kimmel is a threat to America. After Kimmel joked on April 23 that Melania Trump had a “glow like an expectant widow”, and after Melania raised public objections, Trump characterized Kimmel’s joke as a “despicable call to violence” and demanded that Disney and ABC immediately fire Kimmel. The Federal Communications Commission , led by Trump’s hand-picked Chairman Brendan Carr, then ordered Disney’s ABC to seek early broadcast license renewal, even though those licenses were not due for years, with the threat that “[w]e want to review your license now and decide if you’re in the public interest.” U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren called this threat a case of the FCC pulling out “a sword to hang over every single news organization in America.”
Kimmel noted that his joke was obviously about the couple’s age difference — Donald is 79, Melania is 56. Even Republicans including Senators Rafael “Ted” Cruz and Rand Paul, and Rep. James Comer, spoke in support of Kimmel’s First Amendment rights. But Kimmel’s sharpest moment came when he flipped the script on Melania:
I agree that hateful and violent rhetoric is something we should reject. I do. And I think a great place to start would be to have a conversation with your husband about it.
That conversation would be lengthy. For instance:
