Jimmy Kimmel delivers Alternative Christmas Message: “From a fascism perspective, this has been a really great year”
Jimmy Kimmel delivered a scathing anti-Trump monologue during his Alternative Christmas Message for Channel 4 this week.
The channel has invited high-profile individuals to give a speech to the British public on Christmas Day every year since 1993, with previous speakers including Edward Snowden, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Ali G and Marge Simpson.
This year, it was US talk show host Kimmel who delivered the message, just three months after his show was briefly cancelled after political pressure from Donald Trump. ABC suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live! after the host accused the MAGA movement of attempting to exploit the murder of Charlie Kirk, with Trump celebrating the news, but the show was reinstated after just six days after an outcry from the entertainment industry.
Kimmel used the platform to reflect on a tumultuous year in American politics, saying that “from a fascism perspective, this has been a really great year”, adding that “tyranny is booming” in the US.
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Addressing the differences between the US and UK, he directly addressed the controversy from September, saying Trump wanted to “shut me up” because “I don’t adore him in the way he likes to be adored”.
“The American government made a threat against me and the company I work for, and all of a sudden we were off the air,” he said. “But then, you know what happened? A Christmas miracle happened. Well, it was September, it was a September miracle. But the holiday does seem to come earlier and earlier every year, doesn’t it?”
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“Millions and millions of people stood up and said: ‘No, this is not acceptable’. People who never watched my show, people who were on record saying they hate my show spoke out, they marched, they did this all to support the right to a free expression of speech and because so many people spoke out, we came back. Our show came back stronger than ever. We won, the President lost and now I’m back on the air every night givin’ the most powerful politician on earth a right and richly-deserved bollocking. That’s a word, right, I used it properly?”
He went on to warn British viewers that the same pattern could be replicated in other countries in the near future, and urged the UK not to “give up on us”.
His speech concluded: “We’re going through a bit of a wobble right now, but we’ll come around. It may not seem like it, but we love you guys. We even love the things about you that you don’t like, like Simon Cowell for instance. We are not bright. We’re Americans. No one knows better than you we’re always just a little bit late to the game, but do we come through in the end? Maybe. Give us about three years. Please. Thank you for your patience, and thank you for Spider-Man. Merry Christmas, and happy holidays.”
On Kimmel’s return to the airwaves in September, he quadrupled his usual ratings, and gave an emotional monologue in which he clarified that he never intended to “make light” of Kirk’s murder.
