'Authoritarian's dream': Trump official behind Kimmel firing exposed using his own words

Late Wednesday, the network pulled the plug on Kimmel’s show before he took the stage by claiming, “Jimmy Kimmel Live will be pre-empted indefinitely."

That followed a statement from media powerhouse Nexstar Media Group, which owns hundreds of television stations, claiming, “Mr. Kimmel’s comments about the death of Mr. Kirk are offensive and insensitive at a critical time in our national political discourse, and we do not believe they reflect the spectrum of opinions, views or values of the local communities in which we are located.”

As Brzezinski noted, the banning of Kimmel was set in motion by Donald Trump’s handpicked FCC Chair Brendan Carr who previously threatened ABC/Disney on a podcast by stating, “This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead."

"After the suspension was announced, Carr wrote on X, “I want to thank Nexstar for doing the right thing.”

That led the MSNBC host to single out previous comments made by Carr, one of the authors of the far-right Project 2025 Project 2025, where he took a completely opposite view about censorship in years past.

The MSNBC host then shared screenshots taken from Carr's X account several years ago, where he wrote in 2019, “Should the government censor speech It doesn't like? Of course not. The FCC does not have a roving mandate to police speech in. The name of the public interest.”

“In 2021 he wrote, quote, ‘A newsroom's decision about what stories to cover and how to frame them should be beyond the reach of any government official in 2022.” Brzezinski read.

In 2023 he wrote, "Free speech is the counterweight. It is the check on government control. That is why censorship is the authoritarian's dream."

She added, “Carr posted, quote, ‘Political satire is one of the oldest and most important forms of free speech. It challenges those in power while using humor to draw more people into the discussion. That's why people in influential positions have always targeted it for censorship.’”

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