Kimmel's ABC show won't air interview with Democrat because of Trump FCC threats

The Carr FCC also started investigating ABC’s The View after it aired an interview with Talarico and opened a proceeding in May 2026 to examine whether The View should continue to be exempt from the equal-time rule as a “bona fide news interview program.” The View hasn’t aired any interviews of political candidates since the FCC began the proceeding. Until Carr took over at the FCC, the agency historically treated talk shows that feature interviews as exempt from the equal-time rule that requires stations to provide comparable time and placement to an opposing candidate if an opposing candidate makes a request. The Carr FCC ordered broadcast TV stations in January to comply with the equal-time rule when airing late-night and daytime talk shows that are “motivated by partisan purposes,” but has not made similar moves against talk radio shows that are predominantly conservative. Kimmel didn’t recount all of that history last night, but referred to it when he told the audience about the upcoming Talarico interview. Kimmel said: I interviewed Donald Trump when he was running for president in 2015, and at that time when he was the one sitting next to me, he seemed to have no problem with the idea of talk show hosts interviewing candidates. In fact, he was very eager to come back for another interview, which he did just before he became the nominee in 2016. But for some reason, and I can’t seem to figure out what that reason is, something has changed. Now that he’s president, his FCC has threatened me, threatened our show, threatened our network, ABC, our affiliates, our local stations, based on simple, traditional editorial decisions, guest bookings it would seem they don’t like. Kimmel said the decision to put the interview on YouTube was made out of consideration for local stations that could face FCC threats to their broadcast licenses. “And so out of consideration for our local stations, especially our ABC affiliates in Texas who would have to deal with this nonsense, my interview tomorrow with James Talarico will not air on television,” Kimmel said. “It will be posted on YouTube instead. It will not be on TV. So if you want to learn about a candidate for the Senate tomorrow, you will have to go to the Jimmy Kimmel Live YouTube channel where you will see it in its entirety, and thank goodness we have that because in the America we live in right now, that is the best that we can do, until November, of course.” Disney’s legal fight against the FCC is ongoing. The FCC last week urged a court to dismiss Disney’s lawsuit and let it continue a proceeding that could end in the nonrenewal of broadcast licenses held by ABC-owned stations. Watchdog groups told the court they are worried that Disney will agree to a settlement with the FCC that “limits the content provided by the ABC stations.”