The lights went out on Jimmy Kimmel Live! this week. Not because his ratings had tanked, or because advertisers were taking a stand, or because some “woke mob” went after him — Jimmy Kimmel and his show were suspended because billionaires who own the American media decided they were willing to capitulate to a dollar-store despot who decided his voice was no longer acceptable.
This week, Kimmel criticized the right’s reaction to the assassination of Charlie Kirk. He suggested the shooter could have been another radicalized MAGA supporter. Police would later offer a different profile of the suspect while the right ran with the weaponized narrative. But the point is this: comedians react to the moment. It’s the basis of the opening monologue on every late-night show.
Within 24 hours, the pressure campaign began. Right-wing social media lost their shit and FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, a Trump appointee, went on the record calling Kimmel “sick” and hinted at Disney facing consequences if Kimmel’s show continued. Nexstar, the largest owner of ABC affiliates in the country, responded by pulling Jimmy Kimmel Live! from its stations and suspending Kimmel. Sinclair Broadcast Group joined in, going even further — demanding an apology and a donation to Kirk’s family and Turning Point USA — in a statement that essentially amounted to blackmail and mob tactics. By Wednesday night, Disney suspended the show. Trump celebrated on Truth Social, framing it as a victory.
This sequence matters because it shows the line from government pressure to corporate strong arming in order to silence a critic and maintain profit. When a regulator of broadcasting licenses floats the idea of punishing a network, and the affiliates holding most of the market instantly remove a program and a personality, that isn’t free will. It is state coercion made possible by billionaire media consolidation.
The Consolidation Crisis
The suspension also exposes a structural problem. A handful of companies control nearly every lever of American media. Nexstar is in the process of buying Tegna, a $6.2 billion deal that would give it reach into almost 80 percent of U.S. households if regulators (like Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr) approve it. Sinclair already holds enormous power. Gray is not far behind. Together, they dominate what gets marketed and sold as “local news.”
On the studio side, Larry Ellison and his son, David, just closed an $8 billion merger with Paramount. They are now openly vying for a Warner Bros. Discovery deal. Combined, that would give them control of two of the largest content pipelines in the world. Oracle, Larry Ellison’s company which has made him the richest man in the world, is also expected to play a central role in a restructured TikTok, potentially handing him primary cloud partnership and equity shares in a U.S. majority carveout. Ellison is also one of president Trump’s top political donors.
The picture is stark: The same billionaire network of Trump allies (including Rupert Murdoch and Fox News) controlling the studios, the broadcast stations, and the digital platforms — which we saw with Trump’s recent tech dinner. When government pressure comes, those choke points collapse inward. That is what just happened with Jimmy Kimmel.
What's the Future of Media under Trump 2.0? | LIVE with Tara McGowan & Susan Demas
So … let’s talk about the way traditional media has been covering Trump in his second term.
Why So Quiet, Joe?
Against this backdrop, one group has been alarmingly absent. The comedians who have branded themselves over the past decade as defenders of free speech and apparent “modern thought leaders.” Joe Rogan, whose podcast empire’s rightward shift was built on railing against “censorship,” has said nothing. He said nothing when Stephen Colbert was fired earlier this year, and he has said nothing now as Jimmy Kimmel has been sidelined under political pressure.
The silence extends to his podcast/comedy brosphere. Comedians like Tony Hinchcliffe and Tim Dillon — the comics who have positioned themselves as edgy truth-tellers, who mock “woke mobs” and claim to fight for free speech — have offered zero defense. These are the same voices that mobilize entire bits about YouTube demonetizing a clip or Trans people’s effect on comedy. Yet when the state itself leans on corporations to suspend a comedian or fire a colleague, they are silent.
The contradiction is obvious. These comedians have made themselves into cultural figures by claiming to resist censorship. But their silence reveals what has always been true: Their defense of free speech was never about the first amendment. It was about, as Marc Maron said, their need to openly bully people and use lazy slurs. It was about a brand, an audience … money. When speech on the line belongs to someone outside their circle, someone criticizing Dear Leader, they look the other way.
What This Means
Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension is not a sideshow. It’s a case study in how power and authoritarianism operate when the media is consolidated into the hands of a few billionaires and when regulators act as mob enforcers for the White House. It shows how quickly a critic can be silenced. And it reveals how shallow the loudest cultural defenses of free speech really are.
This isn’t cancel culture. It’s a mobbed up White House using political power, backed by corporate consolidation, turning the First Amendment into a weapon rather than a safeguard.
If we let this moment pass without rightfully losing our shit and naming it for what it is, then the precedent will harden. The next comedian, journalist, or critic who challenges Trump or his allies will face the same weaponry — or think twice before doing so. And if Rogan and the rest of the self-proclaimed “free-speech advocates” continue to stay silent, then they are not allies in this fight. They are accessories to the silencing.
Billionaires loyal to the president are about to own nearly 80% of local and national media in this country — ahead of midterm elections and widespread military and police crackdowns in Democrat run cities. Jimmy Kimmel may be one of the first high-profile hosts to feel the wrath of this new system, but he will not be the last.
What went dark this week wasn’t just the Jimmy Kimmel Live! studio. It was a signal about where the First Amendment stands in Trump’s America.
Evan Fields is a veteran who writes the Fourth & Democracy newsletter for Lincoln Square the News from Underground Substack. Read the original article here.
