Of all the major talk show hosts in America, Jimmy Kimmel has arguably tangled with Donald Trump the most. After all, the host of Jimmy Kimmel Live! has called some of Trump's conduct "hateful and vile" during a monologue. Kimmel has also joked about whether Trump might have a crush on him since the President discusses the talk show host so much.
In addition to often grappling with the President himself, Kimmel has also had run-ins with some members of the Trump administration over the last several months. Probably the most noteworthy example of that was when headlines linked Kimmel to the current FCC chair. Weeks after their controversy, the FCC chair has now denied that he "explicitly" tried to get TV channels to take Kimmel off the air.
The FCC chair just denied that he tried to get Jimmy Kimmel taken off TV
On Dec. 17, 2025, the current FCC chairman, Brendan Carr, testified before the Senate Commerce Committee. While the FCC takes a lot of actions, there was no doubt that many of the people who questioned Carr were most interested in comments he'd previously made about whether Jimmy Kimmel should continue being a talk show host.
While Carr spent a lot of time defending his past comments about Kimmel, his most remarkable statement came just before the one-hour, two-minute point of the video below. In response to a pointed question, Carr denied that he directly tried to get TV channels to pull Kimmel's show.
“Democrats at the time were saying that we explicitly threatened to pull a [broadcaster’s] license if Jimmy Kimmel wasn’t fired. That was nothing more than projection by Democrats.”
An NPR article from September 2025 chronicled the controversy that led to Carr being extensively questioned about Kimmel when he appeared before Senators. That article detailed the fact that while talking to Benny Johnson about Kimmel, Carr suggested that the network and channels that run his talk show should take action against him. Carr's remarks that are quoted below were made as a result of something Kimmel said on his show following the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
"We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct to take action on Kimmel or, you know, there's going to be additional work for the FCC ahead."
In response to that comment from Carr, many Democrats decried his remarks and called for consequences. It was more remarkable that they weren't alone, as many republican figures also sounded the alarm at Carr's perceived threat, including Ted Cruz. In the aftermath of Carr's original remark about Kimmel, Cruz labeled the possibility of a government official "arbitrating truth or opinion" as being "dangerous as hell."
A December 2025 Politico article quoted Cruz continuing to express his concern about Carr's past comments. During the same December 2025 hearing that featured Carr denying that he "explicitly" tried to get Kimmel taken off TV, Cruz brought up the possibility of Congress stripping the FCC of some of its enforcement authorities if they were used to dampen free speech.