Seth Meyers isn’t backing down.
The host of NBC’s Late Night said that he is “going to keep doing our show the way we’ve always done it with enthusiasm and integrity”. Admittedly, he ended that joke with a fart sound.
Meyers paid tribute to Jimmy Kimmel after ABC pulled his show from the air. “It is a privilege and an honor to call Jimmy Kimmel my friend, in the same way that it’s a privilege and honor to do this show every night. I wake up every day and I count my blessings that I live in a country that at least purports to worth freedom of speech.”
The comedian spent the majority of tonight’s A Closer Look talking about free speech.
He said this week’s move, which has been celebrated by President Trump and his supporters, is a “pivotal moment in our democracy”. “We must all stand up for the principles of free expression. There is a reason free speech is in the very first amendment. It stands above all others,” he added.
After mocking Trump’s visit to the UK, Meyers showed a number of clips of the President purporting to worth free speech and “bring it back”.
“Trump promised to end government censorship and bring back free speech and he’s doing the opposite and it has experts worried that we’re rapidly devolving into oppressive autocracy in the style of Russia or Hungary, much faster than anyone could have predicted,” he said.
Meyers opened the segment with a gag.
“I just want to say before we get started here, that I’ve always admired and respected Mr. Trump. I’ve always believed he was a visionary, an innovator, a great President and even better golfer. If you’ve ever seen me say anything negative about him, that’s just A.I. I’m told there’s some clips of me on the internet making jokes about it from a few years back. Those are obviously deep fakes,” he joked
Meyer’s comments come 24 hours after ABC indefinitely preempted Jimmy Kimmel Live! following a furor around Kimmel’s comments about Charlie Kirk’s killer.
On Monday, Kimmel said, “We banger some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and with everything they can to score political points from it.”
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr subsequently called Kimmel’s comments “some of the sickest conduct possible”.
This was soon followed by local station Nexstar saying it would “preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! for the foreseeable future” as it “strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk”.
Moments later, Disney made its own decision to pause the show.
Meyers and Kimmel are close, having become friends over the years and particularly thanks to launching the Strike Force Five podcast with Stephen Colbert and John Oliver during the writers strike.
Meyers was a guest on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in May.
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