Late-Night Shockwave: Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Colbert, and More Break Silence on Jimmy Kimmel’s Suspension

ABC just put Jimmy Kimmel Live! on ice with an indefinite suspension, and late-night TV immediately lit up about it. The timing is not subtle: this comes after Kimmel made controversial on-air comments about the shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and slammed the Trump administration's response. Within hours, his peers were weighing in — some joking, most pointed, all very aware of what this means for late-night.

How late-night is reacting

• Jimmy Fallon opened his show with a joke about waking up to a flood of texts — including from his dad — thinking NBC had cancelled his show, before clarifying it was Kimmel. Jokes aside, Fallon nodded to the growing fear around censorship and said he hopes Kimmel is back soon.
• Stephen Colbert defended Kimmel on The Late Show and took aim at comments from FCC Chair Brendan Carr, who urged broadcasters to push back on Disney programming that doesn’t meet 'community values.' Translation for anyone not fluent in corporate chess: Disney owns ABC, which airs Kimmel. Colbert’s response was a free-speech broadside capped with a very Colbert punchline about Alexander Hamilton and 'Hakuna Matata.'
• Seth Meyers, on the Sept. 18 Late Night, got more direct. He skewered what he framed as a crackdown on free speech (with a deadpan, obviously sarcastic aside about how much he admires Trump), called it a privilege to call Kimmel a friend, and said the First Amendment is first for a reason.
• David Letterman, speaking at The Atlantic Festival on Sept. 18, didn’t mince words about where this is headed if networks start pulling shows over political pressure:

'We all see where this is going, correct? This is managed media, and it's no good, it's silly, it's ridiculous, and you can't go around firing somebody because you're fearful or trying to suck up to an authoritarian and criminal administration in the Oval Office. That's just not how this works.'

Jon Stewart took the satirical route on The Daily Show, rolling out a mock 'government-approved' version of the program to lampoon Kimmel’s cancellation.

The inside baseball part

The Brendan Carr angle is worth flagging: when the FCC chair publicly tells broadcasters to push back against Disney content that supposedly falls short of community values, that reads like a not-very-subtle nudge at ABC/Disney over Kimmel. Colbert pounced on it, and the rest of late night clearly sees this as a free-speech line in the sand.

Bottom line: the late-night crowd is closing ranks around Kimmel, blasting what they see as censorship and political pressure, and hoping ABC’s 'indefinite' pause is a short one.