Below is my column in the Hill on the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel and how long advocates of censorship and blacklisting are suddenly alarmed over the threat to free speech. The greatest comedic relief came from Hillary Clinton, one of the most anti-free speech figures of the last decade. Without a hint of self-awareness or shame, Clinton expressed horror at a suspension over spreading disinformation.
Democrats were finally outraged this week. No, it was not about the murder of Charlie Kirk, but rather the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night comedy show.
Democratic leaders are taking to the airways to denounce the decision to take Kimmel off the air after he spread disinformation about Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer.
The same leaders and pundits who have for years fought for censorship in the name of combating disinformation are now making the very arguments they ridiculed just months ago. Democrats once wrote letters to Internet carriers suggesting that Fox News, the most popular cable news network, should be taken off the air in the name of combating disinformation. That was when the Democrats controlled the White House and were targeting conservatives.
Suddenly, now, disinformation is no longer a valid reason to censor and alleged government-corporate alliances are a menace to free speech.
After the tragedy in Utah, many on the left immediately tried to deflect responsibility for the murder by claiming that Kirk’s killer was actually a Trump supporter. On his show, Kimmel declared that “the MAGA Gang” was “desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”
The far-left motivations of the alleged assassin, Tyler Robinson, were already well known. His family confirmed that he had been radicalized with leftist ideology and cited pro-transgender views. This was not even a joke — it was just a false factual claim made by Kimmel on national television. And it came at a time when others were spreading this lie.
Despite stories to the contrary, many repeated the false claim. For example, Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe posted that “Kirk’s apparent assassin seems to have been ultra-MAGA, exploding the GOP/MAGA attempt to pin the blame for this tragedy on liberals.” (Previously, Tribe had claimed that the October 2023 massacre of Israelis by Hamas was a “wag-the-dog” operation to distract from corruption allegations against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu).
The disinformation took hold on the Internet and social media. One poll showed that a plurality of Americans think Robinson was a conservative.
Call it assassination denial. It is all the rage. Former MSNBC and ESPN host Keith Olbermann wrote after Kimmel’s suspension, “Burn in hell, Sinclair. Alongside Charlie Kirk.” He added that “nothing [Kimmel] said was untrue.”
Curiously, some of these politicians and pundits are claiming that, yet again, democracy will die if Kimmel is not allowed to spread disinformation. There are reports that Kimmel was refusing to apologize and planned to double down on the attacks on conservatives in his next show. Faced with a revolt by affiliates and a potential exodus of advertisers, Disney’s head, Bob Iger, pulled the plug. (By the way, Kimmel’s ratings had been falling for years, and he had a smaller audience than the Colbert Show, which was itself discontinued due to loss of money).
The hypocrisy was pure comedy. For years, these same voices demanded censorship of individuals deemed to be spreading disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation. The last category was used by the Biden administration to target statements “based on fact, but used out of context to mislead, harm, or manipulate.”
At the same time, they mocked claims that corporations were working with the government to maintain this censorship system.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) ran on a pledge to impose new criminal and civil penalties for anyone spreading disinformation. Now, however, censorship is intolerable. Warren told CNN “we know there was federal interference … We saw the government step up and give a hard shove and then we saw a compliant company turn around and suspend Mr. Kimmel.” She added that his collaboration with corporations “truly undermines the whole premise of the First Amendment.”
Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) called the suspension one of “the most blatant attacks on the free press in American history.” Schiff had previously demanded that Twitter suspend an array of users and “reduce the visibility” of blacklisted individuals — including a journalist who held opposing views. When Elon Musk reduced censorship at X, it was Schiff who warned Facebook not to follow his example by restoring free speech protections. Schiff threatened legislative action if the company moved to “alter or roll back certain misinformation policies.”
This week, Schiff is outraged by a company’s decision to suspend a host who refused to correct a false story he had spread.
For years, I appeared before these same leaders in Congress as they defended corporate censorship and dismissed allegations of collaboration with the government. I would not cancel Kimmel so long as his show was profitable. But I have long maintained that companies can limit the free speech of employees at work. I do not believe Kimmel should be censored on social media for spreading false information. At the same time, ABC does not have to lose money or viewers because an employee attacks others with vile, false claims.
Now Disney is accused of killing democracy itself, in league with Trump. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) attacked Trump for “trying to destroy our democracy” and acting like “many would-be despots.” Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) used Kimmel’s suspension as evidence that “fascism is not on the way, it is here.”
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) insisted that suspending a host for spreading false information about a murder was “North Korea-style stuff” while Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) insisted that it is “what Putin would do.” It is a curious spin, since Putin and Kim Jong Un value media figures who spread false information — particularly about murders.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) went so far as to compare Kimmel to Thomas Paine, the author of Common Sense and “Penman of the revolution.”
So Kimmel is now a hero of democracy — all he had to do was spread disinformation. That makes this the funniest joke that Kimmel never told.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of the bestselling book “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”
When the progressively stupid file lawsuits to oppose government censorship I will take them seriously. Until that time complaining on CNN MSNBC New York Times Washington Post accomplishes nothing, which is their goal. They want the censorship apparatus to remain in place so they can use it next time. Even if they brought the lawsuit the three Progressively stupid Supreme Court justices Would still side with the government. They would still demonize Gorsuch Alito and Thomas for protecting free speech like they did in the 2024 case.
The progressively stupid are not useful. They are useful idiots.
Umm… you been talking with Bezos then huh? Oh and, suggest you get some meds for that rage of yours.
Which Supreme Court decided that cold-hearted, militant a-holes have the right to disrupt and desecrate a solemn funeral (for a Gold Star family)? Yes, the Westboro Baptist abomination. We have a different SCOTUS now. That one stripped the community of the ability to uphold standards of decency, and instead giving misanthropic individualism a boost.
There’s “speech you don’t like”, and then there’s utter depravity. Those who can’t distinguish the two are blindly dragging our culture into a moral open-sewer. If you don’t think any responsibilities come with freedom-of-speech, think again, because your permissiveness will be abused and eventually turned against your own interests.
Did Kimmel spread disinfo or did he lie? Is there a difference? Does it matter? To me, the term “spreading disinformation” is, in itself, deceptive, because it mitigates and softens the ugly truth. In any case, Kimmel’s ratings have been in the toilet for years. It was high time to flush and I think that’s the real motivation for suspending him. (Sadly, it looks like he’ll be back).
Sort of OT
In the image of the jester (?): What is the object in his right hand? And what is its significance? Usually, a jester is depicted holding a marotte. But that’s clearly not a marotte.
While I am not an art critic, it appears that the jester is holding lensless spectacles in his right hand while at the same time covering one of his eyes with the other hand and perhaps intending to cover both his eyes – clearly a joke perhaps along the line of being “blind in one eye and can’t see out of the other”.
“. . . the jester is holding lensless spectacles in his right hand . . .”
That’s a good observation — which could mean that he is mocking those who are willfully ignorant or in denial: “In some contexts, particularly if the glasses are not being worn, they can symbolize a deliberate refusal to see the truth or ‘turning a blind eye’ to a situation.”
Kimmel’s comments were not a lie. What exactly was the lie? MAGA immediately blames the left for Charlie Kirk’s murder. Even when the left was busy condemning the killing. MAGA and the right were already frothing at the mouth and in a roid-rage-induced anger seeking anyone to blame and scapegoat. Rumors, assumptions, and speculation were flying before any facts, or evidence were present.
We now know Robinson was no leftist or ANTIFA wannabe. He was angry about Kirk’s hateful opinions. Turley even fell victim to the rumor mill and speculation and laid blame on ANTIFA. When that failed he switched to Clinton, an old reliable scapegoat. Instead of focusing on the right’s full embrace of cancel culture and their very leftist attempt to silence critics and mockery of Charlie Kirk he chose to lay blame on everything except Trump and his administration knowing full well they are engaging in the same tactics and actions he clearly blamed Biden for conducting about free speech.
The Republicans have done an impressive 180 and have adopted the same attitude and tactics they despised. The left is pointint out the hypocrisy and hilarious turnabout of the right and Republicans are losing their minds over the fact that they are being called out for being very…leftist in their actions and Professor Turley is pretending to be oblivious to that fact. Perhaps because he too is afraid of the backlash and calls to cancel him for daring to point out the hypocrisy of the right.
I even read this weekend John Say was clearly admitting Trump and FCC’s Carr were wrong with their calls to censor Kimmel, but he clearly didn’t care because he prefers the vindictive need to met out the “turnabout is fair play” excuse instead of sticking to principle.
Say is a known wackjob.
Excellent column professor!! Great how you point out the Democrats lack of self-awareness. It only goes how desperate they are. They have nothing to run on, so they have to resort to the “threat to democracy!” gaslighting.
Oh come on, great it is not. Turley keeps rehashing the same opinions, week in, week out and you, sitting in the peanut gallery, think he written a masterpiece.
How easily you are pleased. Stick shoveling shite dude.
Still shoveling it eh fake farmer.
Turley has said zip about Carr’s comments. Clearly he’s avoiding it like the plague because he knows he will have to criticize Trump and Carr for the anti-speech comments. But he seems to fear MAGA more. Cowardice perhaphs?
Cowardice? At least he signs his name.
And you do?
But you did it first. I win.
To me, this whole Kimmel thing was orchestrated. His show sucked and his ratings were horrible and he most likely new he was on the chopping block. The left needed a distraction from all of the positive Kirk coverage so Kimmel committed suicide on national TV to become a talking point.
Naaa…. nice try.
“ Maga gang” was “desperately trying to characterise this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them” and of trying to “score political points from it”.
Where is the lie? MAGA was indeed trying to blame the left for Charlie Kirk’s murder before hiis body got cold. The assumptions, speculation, rumors and disinformation was thrown around by those on the right before any evidence or facts were known.
Professor Turley is choosing to use Clinton as an excuse to avoid criticizing the Trump administration of doing what blamed the Biden administration of doing. Censorship by proxy. How incredibly ironic. Professor Turley has an opportunity to show how censorship is wrong regardless of who is in power, yet he seems extremely reluctant to criticize Trump for their obvious censorship of speech. Jimmy Kimmel’s Monologue is purely his opinion and the Professor knows it is protected speech. Carr at the FCC clearly issued a threat to broadcasters to shut down Kimmel or face consequeces like denying a merger they desperately needed. I thought Professor Turley was against anti-free speech tactics no matter who is in power. Clearly I was wrong. Hypocrisy seems to be the ongoing theme with the right.
Ah yeah, the cartridges left no clues. Probably placed at the scene by Kirk’s wife. And to distract from the fact that the shooter is gay and enjoys male porn with his gay lover. Definitely a setup; turn the tide.
That you can read into Turleys words is an amazing feat. Akin to schizophrenia.
Kimmel knew he had bad ratings and the shows days were numbered. Why leave as an unpopular show host when you can fabricate an incident that makes you look like a victim? None of these guys come close to Steve Allen, Jack Parr, Johnny Carson or Jay Leno for entertainment value.
Bad ratings was never the issue. Kimmel’s show was among the top 10 performers for ABC for years. ABC executives even acknowledged what Kimmel said did not cross a line. Trump’s FCC explicitly threatened their merger if they didn’t do something about Kimmel’s mockery of Trump and MAGA. Professor Turley is avoiding any criticism of Trump because he will face the same backlash and outrage that is driving MAGA to embrace the cancel culture they despised for years.
So, all within hours Trump, the FCC, not having watched the Kimmel show, suddenly decided to threaten ABC etc… just because of one lame joke?
Hey one anon to another… you’re really fing crazy.
Umm. whats in your tea this morning Margot?
Jimmy Kimmel’s show had worse ratings in general than did CBS’s Colbert Show and was declining in ratings. Given that the Colbert Show was on its last legs, it is no wonder that Kimmel’s show was canceled. Back in the days of the Man Show, Jimmy Kimmel was funny. It seems that his long time declining audience is evidence that his humor had become less popular. Or perhaps the whole late night comedy show concept has become obsolete as all three network shows (Kimmel, Colbert, and Fallon) experienced annual declining audiences. Regardless, the network bosses are in business to make money and have been facing a steady 50% loss of ad revenue over the past 7 years. Something had to change. Arguably ABC’s network bosses have not managed the business pivot very well. I think that they could have provided a better explanation and a ready replacement. That still might not have been sufficient for the erstwhile pro-censorship crowd from beclowning themselves as given by Prof. Turley’s ample examples.
“. . . democracy will die if Kimmel is not allowed to spread disinformation.” (JT)
If the Right is stopped from spreading “disinformation,” democracy lives. If the Left is stopped from doing so, democracy dies.
Here, again, we have the Left’s power-lusting premise: Our words are reality.
There are no facts at the foundation of democracy. There is only a Leftist desire and assertion. So if the Left claims that some speech is anti-democracy, then it is. If the Left claims that some other speech is pro-democracy, then it is.
Dissent at your own peril.
Virtually everything coming from the left is either an outright lie or at the very best misleading. They have no sense of justice or fair play and certainly no shame.
Virtually everything coming from the right is either an outright lie or at the very best misleading. There you go, fixed it.
Excellent column. Watching some of these people fall all over themselves in defense of Kimmel, whose show was probably on the chopping block anyway due to declining viewership, has been something. The deception, histrionics, and gaslighting from the modern left are simply breathtaking, as is their disdain for people’s intelligence. They really do seem to think we’ve all forgotten the past ten years.
Lousy comment.
James,
Well said.
They are not trying to convince us of anything as they know we are much smarter than that. Who they are trying to convince and I would say even scare with their “fascism is not on the way, it is here.” rage rhetoric is their own base. Scary part is this kind of speech could inspire more political violence. And yes, it is they who are the ones spurring it on.
You farmer, you think you’re intelligent? Best one ever.
Well, as a farmer he heaves shite all day long. So naturally he does it here too.
Game. set and match!
The article is right to point out the hypocrisy but it omits an important point: the heavy-handed intervention of Brendan Carr. To the extent this influenced Nexstar, Sinclair or ABC, it introduces the possibility of government censorship, in some ways similar to the actions of the Biden administration. Carr should have kept his mouth shut.
You make a good point. Some administrative agencies have tended to shape the contours of their activities to align with the administration’s goals. Think about Gary Gensler as Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission during the Biden administration promulgating all of those absurd rules. Many of them have since been repealed. Many of the enforcement cases brought by the SEC during the Biden administration have been closed.
I like how you point out the hypocrisy.
I thought Tim Walz’s remark about “North Korea stuff” was particularly funny, when he could have connected far better by calling it “Chinese stuff,” as they are even more notorious about falsification. However, we know Walz is still a willing cheerleader for the CCP.
What was so funny about the North Korea allusion?
yeah what? Just asking for a friend.
This whole saga goes way beyond hypocrisy and double standards, though. It’s another vivid example of the parallel universe of reality created by the Left. They’re so sheltered in their echo chamber bubble that they never hear about true examples of cancel culture and free speech suppression. Off the top of my head, here are some of the people who’ve lost work or been mass censored in recent years because of right-leaning speech: Roseanne Barr, Tucker Carlson, Gina Carano, Jason Aldean, Trent Dilfer, Curt Schilling, Scott Baio, Kelsey Grammar, Tim Allen, Glenn Beck, Dean Cain, Stacy Dash, Greta Van Susteren, the whole Parler platform, the MyPillow guy, Megyn Kelly, JK Rowling, the f-cking President of the United States, anyone who challenged tyrannical government Covid measures, my personal & Politically Incorrect Humor website Facebook pages, those who questioned the 2020 election or the Jan 6th official story,……….I could do this all day! However, you ask most leftists, and they can barely name any of these examples. I’ve done so many eyerolls and face palms the past few days that my whole face is mangled. In the parallel world of leftist reality, this encroachment on free speech is totally a new thing, exclusively pushed by the Right. – educationdojo
Tuffy the rodeo clown was banned for life from ever working at the Missouri State Fair again after he wore an Obama mask as part of his act and said, “I know I’m a clown. He’s running around acting like a clown and doesn’t know he is one.”
The NAACP issued a press release urging the Secret Service and Justice Department to investigate Tuffy the clown.
Tuffy claimed he had worn masks of other Presidents as part of his act and never got fired.
But for wearing a mask of Obama in a comedic act the Left got him banned for life. That was in 2012. 13 years ago.
They banned Tuffy for life so Kimmel ought to be banned for life. A clown for a clown. Except, of course, Tuffy’s bit was actual comedy. Kimmel was spewing unfunny misinformation to deceive people.
Tuffy claimed – solid evidence right there.
“Gessling, according to digitalBURG, “refused to disclose the identity of his colleague behind the mask because he said the prank was his idea and because of the negative attention he’s received.” He’s been banned from performing again at the state fair.
Helling, from the Star, says he’s been hearing from many in Missouri who have strong feelings about what happened and how Gessling’s now being treated. The clown’s supporters, Helling says, believe he was just having fun and exercising his right to free speech. Some also claim that clowns performing at the fair have lampooned other politicians, including President George W. Bush, and not faced such a backlash. Helling says he hasn’t turned up evidence of that happening before at Missouri’s fair.”
Not only wasn’t Tuffy in the mask, he had not been the one to make fun of other politicians. He, instead, coordinated an old fashioned “black face” event, one where white participants mask themselves as Black people to offer them up for ridicule. It should not take being on the left to realize how fundamentally offensive that is. It’s a state fair, not a KKK meet-up.
Whew! You must have been waiting weeks to post that screed.
If Democrats didn’t have double standards they would have no standards at all.
Great column.
Pure hypocrisy. When will the far left liberal Anon trolls start whining about Mr. Turley’s post? It should be hilarious to read!
The hypocrisy was pure comedy. For years, these same voices demanded censorship of individuals deemed to be spreading disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation. The last category was used by the Biden administration to target statements “based on fact, but used out of context to mislead, harm, or manipulate.”
Curiously, some of these politicians and pundits are claiming that, yet again, democracy will die if Kimmel is not allowed to spread disinformation.
So, Kimmel has become the poster child for Democratic messaging? That will tick off Jasmine and AOC, for sure.
LOL LOL LOL!
Fabulous!
Dennis Prager: “Truth is not a left-wing value.”
Nor is it a rightwing value.