Nexstar said that it will continue to preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live!, meaning that the late-night host’s return on Tuesday night won’t have carriage in nearly a quarter of ABC‘s affiliate reach.
In a statement, Nexstar said, “We made a decision last week to preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! following what ABC referred to as Mr. Kimmel’s ‘ill-timed and insensitive’ comments at a critical time in our national discourse. We stand by that decision pending assurance that all parties are committed to fostering an environment of respectful, constructive dialogue in the markets we serve. In the meantime, we note that Jimmy Kimmel Live! will be available nationwide on multiple Disney-owned streaming products, while our stations will focus on continuing to produce local news and other programming relevant to their respective markets.”
Sinclair Broadcast Group, which holds the largest number of ABC affiliates, announced on Monday that it would not broadcast Kimmel’s show. The Walt Disney Co. announced earlier in the day that Kimmel would return to the air on Tuesday, after pulling the show indefinitely last week. That came amid a furor on the right over a remark Kimmel made about MAGA’s characterization of the suspect in the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
The chairman of the FCC, Brendan Carr, appeared on a podcast on Wednesday and warned ABC and its stations of repercussions. Hours later, Nexstar announced that it was pulling Kimmel, and the network soon after said that the late-night talk show was being take off the air indefinitely.
But the decision to pull Kimmel triggered a backlash, with Barack Obama and former Walt Disney Co. CEO Michael Eisner among those calling out what they saw as corporate capitulation to a threat coming from a Trump administration figure. Even Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who chairs the Senate committee that oversees the FCC, said that Carr’s comments were like those of a mafia boss.
Nexstar also has faced criticism that it was attempting to get in the good graces with Carr at a time when it is seeking to merger with another large station group, Tegna. That transaction needs FCC approval. Nexstar also has been championing a rule change at the FCC that would pave the way for the transaction, as well as the consolidation of other broadcast station companies. They want the FCC to repeal a rule that limits any one company from owning stations that reach more than 39% of U.S. households.
Later last week, Nexstar issued a statement saying, “The decision to preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! was made unilaterally by the senior executive team at Nexstar, and they had no communication with the FCC or any government agency prior to making that decision.”
But in his comments on Benny Johnson’s podcast, Carr essentially provided a roadmap for what stations could do to handle the fallout from Kimmel’s remark, suggesting that they otherwise were facing fines or even broadcast license revocation. Carr said that “it’s time that a lot of these licensed broadcasters themselves push back on Comcast and Disney and say, ‘Listen, we’re going to preempt, we’re not going to run Kimmel anymore, and so you straighten this out because we, licensed broadcasters are running into the possibility of fines or license revocation from the FCC if we continue to run content that ends up being a pattern of news distortion.’”
Nexstar is the largest station group in the country, with 32 ABC affiliates. Sinclair owns or controls more than three dozen ABC affiliates. Nexstar and Sinclair together represent almost one-quarter of ABC’s reach to U.S. households.
Nexstar’s ABC affiliates are in major markets including Nashville, Salt Lake City and New Orleans, and mid-sized cities such as Sioux City, IA; Lubbock, TX and Knoxville, TN.
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