Sinclair to air Jimmy Kimmel on its ABC stations

The Sinclair Broadcast Group announced on Friday it will reinstate Jimmy Kimmel Live! on its ABC affiliates after a week-long ban on the late-night show.

Sinclair, which owns local ABC stations across the US, was one of two major networks to pull Kimmel’s programme in the wake of the comedian’s controversial comments on the death of Charlie Kirk.

The broadcast giant said the decision was made after “thoughtful feedback from viewers, advertisers, and community leaders”.

Kimmel returned to air on Tuesday after a brief suspension by ABC, saying in his opening monologue that his comments may have been ill-timed.

“It was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” he said.

By lifting the blackout, Sinclair viewers in cities like Washington, DC, St Louis and Seattle can now watch Kimmel’s show again.

Sinclair said in a press release its discussions with ABC and parent company Disney are “ongoing and constructive”. The media conglomerate said it had suggested measures to promote “accountability” within Disney.

None of those measures have been adopted yet, it said.

Kimmel landed in hot water after his 15 September monologue on conservative firebrand Kirk’s death.

He said US President Donald Trump and his allies were “desperately trying to characterise this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them” and trying to “score political points from it”.

He also likened Trump’s reaction to the influencer’s murder to “how a four-year-old mourns a goldfish”.

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chair Brendan Carr, who was appointed by Trump, threatened to revoke ABC’s broadcast licence during an interview with a conservative podcast.

After Carr’s comments, two broadcast companies, Sinclair and Nexstar Media Group, said they would stop airing the show on their dozens of ABC affiliates.

ABC then pulled the show off the air entirely.

This triggered nationwide debates about free speech, including online trends of people canceling their Disney+ subscriptions.

Disney announced on Monday that Kimmel would return to air, but Sinclair and Nexstar maintained they would not air it.

His return show on Tuesday drew record ratings, with 6.26 million people watching it live despite a quarter of ABC stations not airing it.

Kimmel expressed regret about his earlier joke about Kirk, but also went after Trump and Carr for what he called “mob” censorship tactics.

“Our leader celebrates people losing their livelihoods because he can’t take a joke,” Kimmel said, adding that Trump openly rooting for people to lose their jobs was “un-American” and “dangerous”.

Trump was openly disappointed in Kimmel’s reinstatement.

“I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back,” he wrote in a social media post.