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US President Donald Trump has joined his wife Melania Trump in calling on the ABC TV network to take action against comedian Jimmy Kimmel for jokes targeting her as the debate over free speech, polarising rhetoric and political violence grows louder in the United States.<\/p>\n
Melania Trump on Monday accused the host of Jimmy Kimmel Live! of deepening \u201cthe political sickness within America\u201d with his comedy, two days after gunfire erupted outside the White House Correspondents\u2019 Association dinner, which Trump and her husband attended.<\/p>\n list of 3 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n \u201cPeople like Kimmel shouldn\u2019t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate. A coward, Kimmel hides behind ABC because he knows the network will keep running cover to protect him,\u201d the first lady wrote on X.<\/p>\n \u201cEnough is enough. It is time for ABC to take a stand. How many times will ABC\u2019s leadership enable Kimmel\u2019s atrocious behavior at the expense of our community.\u201d<\/p>\n For his part, President Trump called for sacking the comedian. \u201cJimmy Kimmel should be immediately fired by Disney and ABC,\u201d Trump wrote in a social media post, mentioning ABC\u2019s parent company.<\/p>\n It is highly unusual for the president and his wife to call on a TV network to deplatform a comedian. The First Amendment of the US Constitution bans the government from censoring free speech.<\/p>\n The shooting late on Saturday happened when a gunman tried to enter the hall where the Trumps and top officials were in attendance. Afterwards, a video of Kimmel poking fun at Melania Trump sparked outrage from some members of the president\u2019s Republican Party.<\/p>\n At an \u201calternative\u201d White House correspondents\u2019 dinner on his show on Thursday, Kimmel said: \u201cOur first lady, Melania, is here. Look at Melania, so beautiful. Mrs Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow.\u201d<\/p>\n While the joke played on the perception that the first lady often appears unhappy in public, Trump\u2019s supporters linked the line to the shooting.<\/p>\n President Trump described it as a \u201cdespicable call to violence\u201d.<\/p>\n Kimmel also mocked the first lady\u2019s documentary,\u00a0Melania, which faltered at the box office and was not well-received<\/span>\u00a0by critics.<\/p>\n \u201cI want to congratulate you, madam first lady, on your huge accomplishment \u2013 the world\u2019s first motionless picture,\u201d Kimmel said.<\/p>\n Last year, ABC suspended Kimmel after the Trump administration threatened to take action against the network over commentary by the comedian suggesting that the killer of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk may have been a Republican.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can do this the easy way or the hard way,\u201d Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), said at that time.<\/p>\n \u201cThese companies can find ways to change conduct to take action on Kimmel or, you know, there\u2019s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n After a backlash from free speech advocates, ABC reinstated Kimmel less than a week later.<\/p>\n The White House hit out at Kimmel on Monday, echoing the Trumps\u2019 criticism.<\/p>\n \u201cJust two days prior to the shooting, ABC\u2019s late-night host Jimmy Kimmel disgustingly called First Lady Melania Trump an expectant widow. Who, in their right mind, says a wife would be glowing over the potential murder of her beloved husband?\u201d White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said to reporters.<\/p>\n Leavitt blamed what she called \u201cderanged lies and smears against the president\u201d for political violence targeting Trump.<\/p>\n For years, Republicans have decried any regulations on speech, particularly around the COVID-19 pandemic, and condemned \u201ccancel culture\u201d, efforts to deplatform or sack people over their political views.<\/p>\n But since returning to the White House in January last year, Trump has led an effort to punish criticism of Israel with a campaign of deportation against noncitizens \u2013 including legal permanent residents \u2013 who have been involved in Palestinian rights advocacy.<\/p>\n The shooting on Saturday was the third apparent assassination attempt against President Trump since 2024. It sparked calls to soften political language to address the motives behind political violence.<\/p>\n But Trump himself has a long history of harsh rhetoric. Last week, the president shared a post calling for the assassination of Iranian officials who are rejecting a deal with Washington.<\/p>\n Earlier this month, he threatened to destroy Iranian \u201ccivilisation\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n US President Donald Trump has joined his wife Melania Trump in calling on the ABC TV network to take action against comedian Jimmy Kimmel for jokes targeting her as the debate over free speech, polarising rhetoric and political violence grows louder in the United States. Melania Trump on Monday accused the host of Jimmy Kimmel […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20558,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-us-canada-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20557","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20557"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20557\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20558"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n
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