Jimmy Kimmel Tears Up During Emotional Monologue After Show Returns to Air

Jimmy Kimmel broke his silence after ABC reversed its decision to “indefinitely” pull his late-night show.

ABC announced on Monday, Sept. 22, that it would return Jimmy Kimmel Live! to air on Tuesday, Sept. 23 — just shy of a week after it had put the show on an indefinite hiatus on Wednesday, Sept. 17, following the host’s recent remarks about the late Charlie Kirk.

“Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country,” The Walt Disney Company said Monday in a statement obtained by PEOPLE. “It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive. We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.”

The episode opened with a montage of news clips, featuring journalists and commentators discussing Kimmel’s suspension and subsequent return. The clip then cut to showing Kimmel and his sidekick Guillermo Rodriguez dressed in silly costumes, acknowledging that they needed to change for the big show.

Kimmel then took the stage to a packed studio audience, who erupted into cheers as they gave him a standing ovation. The comedian then thanked fans before jokingly acknowledging the suspension, “Anyway, as I was saying before I was interrupted.”

“If you’re just joining us, we are preempting your regularly scheduled encore episode of Celebrity Family Feud to bring you this special report. I’m happy to be here tonight with you,” he said.

“I’m not sure who had a weirder 48 hours, me or the CEO of Tylenol. It’s been overwhelming,” he said, referencing the Trump Administration linking Tylenol to Autism in children. “I’ve heard from a lot of people over the last six days. I’ve heard from all the people over in the world over the last six days. Everyone I have ever met has reached out 10 or 11 times, weird character from my past. The guy who fired me from my first radio job in Seattle, where we are not airing tonight, by the way. Sorry, Seattle.”

Kimmel continued, “I want to thank everyone who checked in, but some that I do especially wanna mention are my fellow late and night talk show hosts,” noting how his “friend” Stephen Colbert was in the same “predicament” as him while recognizing other famed late-night hosts. He even thanked conservative figures like Candace Owens, Ted Cruz and Ben Shapiro for showing their support, saying “it takes courage for them to speak out against this administration.”

He then acknowledged his previous comments that led to the suspension, getting choked up over the matter. “I do wanna make something clear, because it’s important to me as a human, and that is, you understand that it was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” referencing Kirk’s assassination. “I don’t, I don’t think there’s anything funny about it.”

And, on a timely front, Kimmel addressed the importance of free speech. “If we don’t have free speech, then we just don’t have a free country. It’s as simple as that.”

The network’s decision to pull Kimmel’s show came after broadcast companies Nexstar and Sinclair said they would preempt airings of Jimmy Kimmel Live! from ABC affiliates across the country due to the host’s remarks about Kirk’s murder, which they condemned.

Kirk, a conservative commentator, was shot and killed during a speaking event at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10 at the age of 31. A memorial was held for Kirk on Sunday, Sept. 21.

Kimmel’s comments that have come under fire pertained to Kirk and his accused killer, Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old charged with aggravated murder in connection with Kirk’s death.

“We hit 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 doing everything they can to score political points from it,” he said during the Monday, Sept. 15, episode during his opening monologue. “In between the finger-pointing, there was grieving.”

Kimmel then showed clips of President Donald Trump being asked about Kirk’s death, with one reporter offering him their condolences and asking how he’s holding up. The president responded by saying “I think very good,” before changing the subject to the construction of the new ballroom at the White House.

As the camera cut back to Kimmel, he said, “Yes, he’s at the fourth stage of grief: construction.”

“This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend,” Kimmel added. “This is how a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish, okay?”

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr has praised both Nexstar, the largest local broadcast and digital media company in the U.S., and Sinclair, which makes up the nation’s largest ABC affiliate group, for their decision to pull Kimmel’s show in posts he shared to X.

Nexstar recently announced plans to acquire Tegna, a rival broadcast company, for more than $6 billion, a massive deal that would further consolidate the local television landscape and put Nexstar in 80% of America’s TV-owning households — despite current law permitting no more than 39% — according to a press release. The acquisition requires final approval from the Trump-controlled and Carr-run FCC.

Sinclair laid out a list of demands for Kimmel to meet before it would return Jimmy Kimmel Live! to the air, including him issuing “a direct apology to the Kirk family” and making a “meaningful personal donation to the Kirk Family and Turning Point USA,” Kirk’s nonprofit that advocates for conservative politics on high school, college and university campuses.

Following Disney’s decision to return Jimmy Kimmel Live! to air, Sinclair and Nexstar both revealed they would continue preempting the show in their local markets. Again, Carr praised the broadcast companies for standing up to their network counterpart.

Directly after Kirk’s death, Kimmel took to social media to decry the “horrible and monstrous” killing.

“Instead of the angry finger-pointing, can we just for one day agree that it is horrible and monstrous to shoot another human?” he wrote at the time. “On behalf of my family, we send love to the Kirks and to all the children, parents and innocents who fall victim to senseless gun violence.”

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Kimmel, who has hosted his late-night show on ABC since 2003, has been an outspoken critic of Trump since he first ran for president in 2016.

Trump, who has been at war with late-night hosts in recent months, celebrated Kimmel being taken off the air and said he was “fired for lack of talent.” Trump had previously predicted Kimmel would be the next late-night casualty following the cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert at CBS in July.

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Following ABC’s move against Kimmel, he has received support from Hollywood pals, industry unions and his fellow late-night hosts, including Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers, John Stewart and Colbert.

Jimmy Kimmel Live! airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET on ABC.