JFK conspiracy theorists often suggest that perhaps the mafia had something to do with the president’s assassination in 1963.
In 2025, if an organized crime syndicate ran America, would things be playing out any differently than they are so far?
Donald Trump and his administration so far this year have shaken down Big Tech for millions in donations to his second presidential inauguration, and through the threat of litigation or worse persuaded major media brands to cough up many millions more. ABC paid $15 million already to settle one of Trump’s many unproven defamation lawsuits.
And now…this.
Just 48 hours after joking with Emmy-winning late-night host John Oliver about how funny yet horrible it might’ve been had Jimmy Kimmel won the Outstanding Talk Show Emmy on Sunday instead of Stephen Colbert, ABC shelved Jimmy Kimmel Live! in a shocking turn of events on Wednesday.
It all happened in a matter of hours.
And on the 24th anniversary of Bill Maher’s statements about the 9/11 terrorists on Politically Incorrect that eventually got his show canned by ABC, and replaced months later by Jimmy Kimmel Live!
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr appeared as a guest Wednesday on Benny Johnson’s “The Benny Show,” where Johnson described Kimmel’s comments as “demonstrably evil” and then went on to falsely ascribe to Kimmel things that the comedian did not actually say on air. Nevertheless, Carr was all-in on threatening ABC and its affiliates with taking away their broadcast licenses.
“These companies can find ways to change conduct, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead,” Carr said, adding later: “Calls for Kimmel to be fired — I think, you could certainly see a path forward for a suspension over this. You know, the FCC is going to have remedies.”
Nexstar Media Group, which owns more than 200 TV stations in the United States (including The CW, as well as more than two dozen ABC affiliates), quickly rushed out a statement Wednesday that “Nexstar’s owned and partner television stations affiliated with the ABC Television Network will preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! for the foreseeable future beginning with tonight’s show. Nexstar strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk and will replace the show with other programming in its ABC-affiliated markets.”
Nexstar Media Group also just so happened to announce last month that it wants to acquire TEGNA for $6.2 billion, and that can only happen if the FCC decides to change their rules on media ownership to allow it.
Then Sinclair, which owns more ABC affiliates than anyone else, joined in and upped the ante, not only announcing it’d air a tribute to Charlie Kirk in Kimmel’s time slot on Friday night (when Kimmel would air a rerun normally), but also demanding an apology and assurances from ABC.
Disney-owned ABC quickly caved. Or at least told affiliates that Jimmy Kimmel Live! wouldn’t produce new episodes Wednesday or Thursday, with further instructions forthcoming.
What are the words that the FCC and Nexstar and Sinclair alleged Kimmel said that were so “offensive” about Kirk?
On the day Charlie Kirk was murdered, Kimmel said exactly what you’d think Republicans would want him to have said:
When he returned this week for Monday night’s monologue, Kimmel suggested “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.”
But Kimmel made fun of Trump, not Kirk, showing a clip of Trump answering a question about how he’s handling it all by boasting about construction at the White House instead. “This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend. This is how a four-year-old mourns a goldfish. OK? And it didn’t just happen once.” Kimmel also mocked the folks at Fox and Friends, and made digs at FBI Director Kash Patel’s expense. But he praised Utah Gov. Spencer Cox for doing just what Kimmel’s critics claim they’re seeking: calming the political climate.
Kimmel did have more to say Tuesday, but again, none of it was directed at the late co-founder of Turning Point USA; rather, Kimmel saved his ire and irony for Vice President JD Vance.
“Meanwhile, many in MAGA Land are working very hard to capitalize on the murder of Charlie Kirk. Yesterday, JD Vance, who himself famously called Donald Trump America’s Hitler, hosted the Charlie Kirk podcast from the White House, where he pointed his little mascara-stained finger directly at the left.”
He then played a clip where Vance proclaimed false stats about politically-motivated crimes in the United States. Or as Kimmel said after the clip: “And by statistical fact, he means complete bullshit.” Applause from the studio audience drowns him out for a few words, after which we hear him add: “In fact, so much so that the Department of Justice just removed the study that showed white supremacy and violence from far-right groups is the greatest source of domestic terror and extremist violence in the United States. Here’s a question JD Vance might be able to answer: Who wanted to hang the guy who was vice president before you? Was that the liberal left or the toothless army who stormed the Capitol on January 6th? The president and his henchmen are doing their best to fan the flames so they can, I guess, attack people on the dangerous left. Which is it? Are they bunch of sissy pickleball players because they’re too scared to get hit by tennis balls or a well-organized deadly team of commandos? Because it can’t be both of those things.” He then goes on to make fun of a commentator on Newsmax.
No lies detected. Also he’s not really trying to make jokes. This is far from funny, this entire situation.
It’s wild to think this all happened the same week that the U.S. Court of Appeals sided with Kimmel in a lawsuit filed against him and his show by former New York Congressman and convicted felon George Santos. Santos, expelled from Congress at the end of 2023 and sentenced this year to 87 months in prison for identity theft and wire fraud, had sued Kimmel for pranking Santos through his pay-for-say Cameo account, airing the resulting videos on air in “Will Santos Say It?” segments.
On Monday, the circuit court upheld the District Court’s dismissal, holding that Santos’s copyright claims were barred by the fair use doctrine and that he failed to state a claim anyhow.
That was Monday. Monday.
Oh, about that mafia reference up top.
While noting that Sept. 17 happens to be the 24th anniversary of the last time ABC found itself in the crosshairs of the political mob over its late-night programming and eventually capitulated, I thought about how conventional wisdom holds that we’re doomed to repeat history if we do not learn from it. Some argue it’s not so much history repeating itself, as much as it echoes, or that society cycles through the same four stages across generations and centuries.
Which reminded me how a century ago, it was the American Mafia, or The Mob, who helped coin the term “stand-up comedian.”
As fellow documenter of comedy Kliph Nesteroff opened the third chapter of his book, The Comedians, twas The Mob who ran speakeasies and the entertainment within them during the Prohibition era of the 1920s, and then the nightclubs of the 1930s. Nesteroff quoted the late George Jessel, who named names of Chicago comedians who paid mobsters for protection services. “If they didn’t, they were told, they would get hurt. ‘Remember Joe E. Lewis?’ was the usual admonition,” Jessel said. Lewis got roughed up in 1927 by three Mob enforcers after he broke a contract at one club to perform at another run by a rival gang. Lewis was left for dead and couldn’t speak for three years, but eventually recovered enough to enjoy a lengthy career.
One of the mobsters who attacked Lewis that night in 1927? Sam Giancana.
Yes, the same Sam Giancana who other conspiracy theorists believe helped JFK win Illinois and thereby the 1960 presidential election, only to allegedly also be involved in nefarious dealings in Cuba and JFK’s assassination.
The shakedowns and intimidation tactics we’ve been seeing in 2025 aren’t exactly like those of 1925, the 1960s, or even 2001.
But they’re awfully troubling all the same.
From The Comic's Comic 
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