"What the American public always wants is a tragedy with a happy ending"
--William Dean Howells, 1906
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/18/business/media/trump-kimmel-cancel-culture-free-speech.html
Media Memo
Media Memo
Trump Administration Wields Its Full Toolbox to Bring Media to Heel
ABC’s decision to “indefinitely” suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night talk show illuminates the administration’s efficacy so far.
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ABC’s decision to silence the comedian Jimmy Kimmel under pressure from the Trump administration comes after multimillion-dollar legal settlements from several television networks. Credit: Mark Abramson for The New York Times
by Jim Rutenberg
September 19, 2025
New York Times
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President Trump received thunderous applause during his second inaugural address in January when he vowed to “immediately stop all government censorship and bring back free speech to America.”
It was in keeping with the popular free-speech refrain of his long march out of the political wilderness and his first-term broadsides against “cancel culture,” which he had called “the very definition of totalitarianism.” His message had particular resonance with his supporters. After all, major social media companies banished him and others from their services in the days and weeks after the Jan. 6, 2021, riots.
Yet he is now conducting the most punishing government crackdown against major American media institutions in modern times, using what seems like every tool at his disposal to eradicate reporting and commentary with which he disagrees.
ABC’s decision on Wednesday to “indefinitely” suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night talk show, for comments the host made about the assassination of the conservative activist Charlie Kirk, illuminates the administration’s efficacy so far. Far from decrying the silencing of a comedian, Mr. Trump celebrated what he termed a “cancellation” by declaring it “Great News for America” on Truth Social. He later said networks whose hosts are critical of him should lose their right to broadcast.
The decision comes after multimillion-dollar legal settlements from CBS and ABC in lawsuits filed by Mr. Trump that legal experts had viewed as long shots; after CBS News’s agreement to change the way it presents political interviews under administration pressure; and after an agreement by CBS’s newly merged parent company, Paramount Skydance, to appoint an “ombudsman” to hear complaints about its coverage. (The company named for the job a conservative policy veteran.)
“Taken together, the attacks on all of our media institutions is certainly unprecedented in modern American history,’’ said Victor Pickard, a professor of media policy at the University of Pennsylvania. “I can’t think of any parallel.”
The Kimmel suspension was particularly striking, Professor Pickard said, because it came so quickly after the Federal Communications Commission’s chairman, Brendan Carr, a Trump appointee, suggested in unambiguous terms that he could consider punishing the local stations that carried Mr. Kimmel’s shows.
On Wednesday, ABC said it would “indefinitely” suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night talk show for comments about the assassination of the conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Credit: Christopher Polk/Getty Images
Mr. Carr was among those who had accused Mr. Kimmel of lying about the political beliefs of Mr. Kirk’s assassin, Tyler Robinson. Mr. Kimmel, on his show on Monday, said that Mr. Trump’s supporters were “desperately trying” to paint Mr. Robinson “as anything other than one of them.” (Law enforcement authorities said Mr. Robinson of Utah had recently appeared to shift leftward in his views.)
Speaking with the right-wing podcaster Benny Johnson, Mr. Carr said the F.C.C. was going to need to look into “remedies,’’ pointedly saying that the “licensed broadcasters” who carry ABC’s programming needed to push back against the parent network.
In putting the onus on ABC’s stations, Mr. Carr appeared to be borrowing a page from the playbook of the Nixon administration. It had pioneered the practice of floating potential action against station licenses to pressure the major networks to toe the administration’s line.
Mr. Carr was among those who had accused Mr. Kimmel of lying about the political beliefs of Mr. Kirk’s assassin, Tyler Robinson. Mr. Kimmel, on his show on Monday, said that Mr. Trump’s supporters were “desperately trying” to paint Mr. Robinson “as anything other than one of them.” (Law enforcement authorities said Mr. Robinson of Utah had recently appeared to shift leftward in his views.)
Speaking with the right-wing podcaster Benny Johnson, Mr. Carr said the F.C.C. was going to need to look into “remedies,’’ pointedly saying that the “licensed broadcasters” who carry ABC’s programming needed to push back against the parent network.
In putting the onus on ABC’s stations, Mr. Carr appeared to be borrowing a page from the playbook of the Nixon administration. It had pioneered the practice of floating potential action against station licenses to pressure the major networks to toe the administration’s line.
Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, was among those who had accused Mr. Kimmel of lying about the political beliefs of Mr. Kirk’s assassin, Tyler Robinson. Credit: Tierney L. Cross for The New York Times
The networks rely on independent stations and station groups to carry their programs nationally.
Mr. Nixon saw the managers of those stations, particularly in Republican-led areas, as potential allies against their affiliated networks in New York. He was consumed by the Watergate scandal before the plan bore much fruit, but he was onto something.
Some 30 years later, it was pressure from affiliates that helped force the last major cancellation of a late-night show in the wake of a political uproar. In 2002, ABC ended Bill Maher’s show, “Politically Incorrect,” after criticism from the White House of comments he had made related to the Sept. 11 attacks.
The difference this time was that Mr. Carr’s comments explicitly referred to the fact that stations are licensed by the government. And they were swiftly followed by announcements by a major station group with ABC affiliates, Nexstar, that it would independently pre-empt Mr. Kimmel’s show. ABC followed with an announcement that it would do so nationally, “indefinitely,” though it did not say why. As it happens, Nexstar is pursuing a station merger that will require F.C.C. approval. (Sinclair, another major owner of local stations, then said it would pre-empt Mr. Kimmel’s show, as well.)
Speaking on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show after the cancellation, Mr. Carr sharpened his focus on station licenses, noting that broadcast license holders are expected to operate in the “public interest, convenience and necessity.”
Conservative orthodoxy had long disfavored such government content dictates, which helped bring an end to the related Fairness Doctrine — which, among other things, required broadcasters to present all sides of disputed issues — in the Reagan era, and succeeded in bringing a more laissez-faire sensibility to the F.C.C.
Mr. Carr noted that his agency had “walked away from enforcing that public interest obligation,” but told Mr. Hannity that was now changing. “We at the F.C.C. are going to enforce the public interest obligation,” he said. “If there’s broadcasters out there that don’t like it, they can turn their license in.”
Mr. Carr had been an ardent critic of the Biden administration when it sought to pressure social media platforms over the circulation of health and election misinformation.
“We have been living through a surge in censorship,’’ he said in a speech in the spring of 2024. “Any time you have an increase in government control, you necessarily have a decrease in free speech because free speech is the counterweight; free speech is the check on government control.”
Then again, Mr. Trump made the same shift. Even now, he and his administration inveigh against any hint of so-called content moderation on social media — which tended to, for instance, affect him and his supporters when they falsely said that the 2020 election was stolen — as they pursue efforts to punish journalists, comedians and commentators who displease Mr. Trump.
The networks rely on independent stations and station groups to carry their programs nationally.
Mr. Nixon saw the managers of those stations, particularly in Republican-led areas, as potential allies against their affiliated networks in New York. He was consumed by the Watergate scandal before the plan bore much fruit, but he was onto something.
Some 30 years later, it was pressure from affiliates that helped force the last major cancellation of a late-night show in the wake of a political uproar. In 2002, ABC ended Bill Maher’s show, “Politically Incorrect,” after criticism from the White House of comments he had made related to the Sept. 11 attacks.
The difference this time was that Mr. Carr’s comments explicitly referred to the fact that stations are licensed by the government. And they were swiftly followed by announcements by a major station group with ABC affiliates, Nexstar, that it would independently pre-empt Mr. Kimmel’s show. ABC followed with an announcement that it would do so nationally, “indefinitely,” though it did not say why. As it happens, Nexstar is pursuing a station merger that will require F.C.C. approval. (Sinclair, another major owner of local stations, then said it would pre-empt Mr. Kimmel’s show, as well.)
Speaking on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show after the cancellation, Mr. Carr sharpened his focus on station licenses, noting that broadcast license holders are expected to operate in the “public interest, convenience and necessity.”
Conservative orthodoxy had long disfavored such government content dictates, which helped bring an end to the related Fairness Doctrine — which, among other things, required broadcasters to present all sides of disputed issues — in the Reagan era, and succeeded in bringing a more laissez-faire sensibility to the F.C.C.
Mr. Carr noted that his agency had “walked away from enforcing that public interest obligation,” but told Mr. Hannity that was now changing. “We at the F.C.C. are going to enforce the public interest obligation,” he said. “If there’s broadcasters out there that don’t like it, they can turn their license in.”
Mr. Carr had been an ardent critic of the Biden administration when it sought to pressure social media platforms over the circulation of health and election misinformation.
“We have been living through a surge in censorship,’’ he said in a speech in the spring of 2024. “Any time you have an increase in government control, you necessarily have a decrease in free speech because free speech is the counterweight; free speech is the check on government control.”
Then again, Mr. Trump made the same shift. Even now, he and his administration inveigh against any hint of so-called content moderation on social media — which tended to, for instance, affect him and his supporters when they falsely said that the 2020 election was stolen — as they pursue efforts to punish journalists, comedians and commentators who displease Mr. Trump.
A MAGA hat left at a makeshift memorial at Utah Valley University after the recent killing of Charlie Kirk on campus. Credit: Loren Elliott for The New York Times
Even before the assassination of Mr. Kirk, Mr. Trump was gaining steam in his campaign against traditional media companies. Now, it has picked up even more.
In a suit Mr. Trump filed against The New York Times this week, the president pointed to the settlements from ABC and CBS as vindication that his suits were “highly meritorious.”
Vice President JD Vance said those who celebrated Mr. Kirk’s death might be protected on free-speech grounds, but they should not be protected from being fired or, in the case of college professors, losing federal funding. Attorney General Pam Bondi told a podcaster: “We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.”
She amended her comments later to say she would not prosecute speech but incitements to violence.
Mr. Trump wasn’t as nuanced on Tuesday when Jonathan Karl, a news correspondent from Mr. Kimmel’s network, pressed him on Ms. Bondi’s comments and the implications for free speech.
“She’ll probably go after people like you, because you treat me so unfairly,” Mr. Trump said. “You have a lot of hate in your heart. Maybe they will come after ABC.”
On Thursday, Mr. Trump called Mr. Kimmel a “whack job” and said he believed regulators should revoke broadcast licenses over late-night hosts who are critical of him.
“It will be up to Brendan Carr,” he said.
Jim Rutenberg is a writer at large for The Times and The New York Times Magazine and writes most often about media and politics.
A version of this article appears in print on Sept. 19, 2025, Section A, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: Trump Hits the Media With Everything He Has. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper
See more on: Donald Trump, Federal Communications Commission, U.S. Politics, Jimmy Kimmel, The New York Times
News and Analysis About the Media
ABC: The network pulled Jimmy Kimmel’s show “indefinitely” after the F.C.C. chair suggested he would take action against it for comments the host made about the politics of the man accused of killing Charlie Kirk.
The New York Times: President Trump sued the news organization, claiming The Times defamed him and sought to undermine his campaign in the 2024 election.
Univision: Jorge Ramos, the longtime anchor for Univision, and his daughter are making a podcast trying to tap into the growing number of Hispanics who consume media in English.
The Atlantic: The magazine is said to have quietly agreed to pay more than $1 million to settle a defamation lawsuit by the writer Ruth Shalit Barrett after it retracted her article and published an editor’s note.
Another Acquisition?: David Ellison, the media mogul who took over Paramount just last month, has already set his sights on another blockbuster deal: He wants to buy Warner Bros. Discovery.
Even before the assassination of Mr. Kirk, Mr. Trump was gaining steam in his campaign against traditional media companies. Now, it has picked up even more.
In a suit Mr. Trump filed against The New York Times this week, the president pointed to the settlements from ABC and CBS as vindication that his suits were “highly meritorious.”
Vice President JD Vance said those who celebrated Mr. Kirk’s death might be protected on free-speech grounds, but they should not be protected from being fired or, in the case of college professors, losing federal funding. Attorney General Pam Bondi told a podcaster: “We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.”
She amended her comments later to say she would not prosecute speech but incitements to violence.
Mr. Trump wasn’t as nuanced on Tuesday when Jonathan Karl, a news correspondent from Mr. Kimmel’s network, pressed him on Ms. Bondi’s comments and the implications for free speech.
“She’ll probably go after people like you, because you treat me so unfairly,” Mr. Trump said. “You have a lot of hate in your heart. Maybe they will come after ABC.”
On Thursday, Mr. Trump called Mr. Kimmel a “whack job” and said he believed regulators should revoke broadcast licenses over late-night hosts who are critical of him.
“It will be up to Brendan Carr,” he said.
Jim Rutenberg is a writer at large for The Times and The New York Times Magazine and writes most often about media and politics.
A version of this article appears in print on Sept. 19, 2025, Section A, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: Trump Hits the Media With Everything He Has. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper
See more on: Donald Trump, Federal Communications Commission, U.S. Politics, Jimmy Kimmel, The New York Times
News and Analysis About the Media
ABC: The network pulled Jimmy Kimmel’s show “indefinitely” after the F.C.C. chair suggested he would take action against it for comments the host made about the politics of the man accused of killing Charlie Kirk.
The New York Times: President Trump sued the news organization, claiming The Times defamed him and sought to undermine his campaign in the 2024 election.
Univision: Jorge Ramos, the longtime anchor for Univision, and his daughter are making a podcast trying to tap into the growing number of Hispanics who consume media in English.
The Atlantic: The magazine is said to have quietly agreed to pay more than $1 million to settle a defamation lawsuit by the writer Ruth Shalit Barrett after it retracted her article and published an editor’s note.
Another Acquisition?: David Ellison, the media mogul who took over Paramount just last month, has already set his sights on another blockbuster deal: He wants to buy Warner Bros. Discovery.
“What’s Past is Prologue…”
July 7, 2020
Harper’s Magazine and New York Times
"Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced."
--James Baldwin
All,
FOR THE RECORD:
I agree 100% with Greg Tate and Rich Blint in every single thing they say in their posts below RE: the egregiously self serving, hopelessly entitled, and blatant intellectual, political, and ethical DISHONESTY of the “Artists and Writers Open Letter” that appeared in the New York Times today
@https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/arts/harpers-letter.html
Thank you Mr. Tate and Mr. Blint…and Pass the Word…
Kofi
https://www.facebook.com/Congoblondie
Greg Tate:
"The Problem with The Letter on creative freedom is that it doesn't address the ass-saving and fauxpologetic guilt reflexes of powerful institutions who cancel their own employees because they want to dissociate their well-buffed and well endowed public images (and non-transparent profiteering ) from charges of racism and various other 'phobias. THEY are the real perpetuators of Cancel Culture not the Tweeting chillun. How Sway? Its utter BS to float this pretense that suddenly, summer 2020, some ragtag groups of young artists or activists complainants now got decision making juice in the most powerful boardrooms in corporate America or in the cabals of the one-percent funded American culture industry. Once again such entities don't mind BEING white supremacists behind closed doors (and in all the structurally hidden ways they profit from white skin privilege ) they just don't want to carry The Burden of LOOKING like systemic, anti-democratic violators of human rights. Now more than ever the manic, anxious intent on high seems 'Please somebody help us get this horrible stain of greed-gorged whiteness off our billion dollar enterprise' through token firings of embarrassing employees or decades overdue erasures of past egregious branding and content without any organizational interrogation of long standing exploitative and anti-inclusive practices or discussion of REAL Reparations. GTFOHWTCABS.
Greg Tate for those who don't know what the hell we going on bout now: @ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/arts/harpers-letter.html
Artists and Writers Warn of an ‘Intolerant Climate.’ Reaction Is Swift.
nytimes.com
Rich Blint:
The letter is profoundly ahistorical, self interested, and tone deaf. Establishment liberals, black and white, are so terrified of any real challenge to the lucrative status quo that they will evacuate centuries of history and then want to talk about open debate as they quote Baldwin. And all of this abstraction happens while bodies keep piling up around us. Shameful!
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/arts/harpers-letter.html
Artists and Writers Warn of an ‘Intolerant Climate.’ Reaction Is Swift.
An open letter published by Harper’s, signed by luminaries including Margaret Atwood and Wynton Marsalis, argued for openness to “opposing views.” The debate began immediately.
PHOTO: Clockwise from top left: Bill T. Jones, Gloria Steinem, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Salman Rushdie, Wynton Marsalis and Margaret Atwood. Credit: Clockwise from top left: Brad Ogbonna for The New York Times; Celeste Sloman for The New York Times; Mamadi Doumbouya; Joel Saget/Agence France-Presse -- Getty Images; Maridelis Morales Rosado for The New York Times; Arden Wray for The New York Times
Thank you Mr. Tate and Mr. Blint…and Pass the Word…
Kofi
https://www.facebook.com/Congoblondie
Greg Tate:
"The Problem with The Letter on creative freedom is that it doesn't address the ass-saving and fauxpologetic guilt reflexes of powerful institutions who cancel their own employees because they want to dissociate their well-buffed and well endowed public images (and non-transparent profiteering ) from charges of racism and various other 'phobias. THEY are the real perpetuators of Cancel Culture not the Tweeting chillun. How Sway? Its utter BS to float this pretense that suddenly, summer 2020, some ragtag groups of young artists or activists complainants now got decision making juice in the most powerful boardrooms in corporate America or in the cabals of the one-percent funded American culture industry. Once again such entities don't mind BEING white supremacists behind closed doors (and in all the structurally hidden ways they profit from white skin privilege ) they just don't want to carry The Burden of LOOKING like systemic, anti-democratic violators of human rights. Now more than ever the manic, anxious intent on high seems 'Please somebody help us get this horrible stain of greed-gorged whiteness off our billion dollar enterprise' through token firings of embarrassing employees or decades overdue erasures of past egregious branding and content without any organizational interrogation of long standing exploitative and anti-inclusive practices or discussion of REAL Reparations. GTFOHWTCABS.
Greg Tate for those who don't know what the hell we going on bout now: @ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/arts/harpers-letter.html
Artists and Writers Warn of an ‘Intolerant Climate.’ Reaction Is Swift.
nytimes.com
Rich Blint:
The letter is profoundly ahistorical, self interested, and tone deaf. Establishment liberals, black and white, are so terrified of any real challenge to the lucrative status quo that they will evacuate centuries of history and then want to talk about open debate as they quote Baldwin. And all of this abstraction happens while bodies keep piling up around us. Shameful!
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/arts/harpers-letter.html
Artists and Writers Warn of an ‘Intolerant Climate.’ Reaction Is Swift.
An open letter published by Harper’s, signed by luminaries including Margaret Atwood and Wynton Marsalis, argued for openness to “opposing views.” The debate began immediately.
PHOTO: Clockwise from top left: Bill T. Jones, Gloria Steinem, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Salman Rushdie, Wynton Marsalis and Margaret Atwood. Credit: Clockwise from top left: Brad Ogbonna for The New York Times; Celeste Sloman for The New York Times; Mamadi Doumbouya; Joel Saget/Agence France-Presse -- Getty Images; Maridelis Morales Rosado for The New York Times; Arden Wray for The New York Times
• 2da Edición Congreso Panamericano EN VIVO ... 
