A 10-second bit by ABC comedian Jimmy Kimmel plunged Walt Disney Co. into a full-blown crisis that rippled across America.
President Trump, the Federal Communications Commission chief and others were angered this month over Kimmel’s remarks about the Charlie Kirk shooting, which they said had suggested the suspect was a “Make America Great Again” Republican. Kimmel asserted Trump supporters were “trying to score political points” from the tragedy.
TV station groups pulled the program and Disney benched the comedian, sparking a bigger backlash. Protesters lit into the Mouse House for seemingly kowtowing to the Trump administration, consumers canceled Disney+ and Hulu subscriptions and more than 400 celebrities, including Tom Hanks, Jamie Lee Curtis and Lin-Manuel Miranda, signed a letter calling for a defense of free speech. Some investors bailed, briefly erasing nearly $4 billion in corporate market value.
Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger and his team turned the tide last week when they returned Kimmel to his late-night perch.
But the pressure on Disney’s top brass remains. Trump was not happy over Kimmel’s comeback, grousing that he may lob another lawsuit at ABC. In December, Disney agreed to pay $15 million to end a defamation suit Trump brought against the network and anchor George Stephanopoulos over misstatements.
And FCC Chairman Brendan Carr — who threatened ABC over Kimmel’s comments — isn’t backing down; he’s already opened one investigation into Disney and ABC for their diversity embrace.
“This [situation] isn’t going away anytime soon,” Nien-hê Hsieh, a Harvard Business School professor, said in an interview. “How it is managed certainly matters a lot.”
The Kimmel controversy exposed cracks at the Burbank company that has long meticulously managed its image. It also highlighted the fraught environment facing Disney’s next leader during a period of significant challenges for the entertainment juggernaut.
“Succession is difficult for any company — the stakes are high,” Hsieh said. “But Disney also is kind of a lightning rod that attracts criticism because of its brand and its prevalence and prominence.”
Iger, 74, is retiring for a second time in late 2026, when his contract expires. Within a few months, Disney’s board is expected to name a replacement — a pivotal decision for a company that has long struggled with succession.
Aside from the Trump administration, Disney’s next boss must navigate the shift to streaming, competition from tech giants, the rise of artificial intelligence, a potential economic slowdown and fragile geopolitics with a theme park in China and one planned for the Middle East. The new CEO also must try to keep Disney from again being drawn into America’s culture wars.
Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger is expected to retire at the end of 2026 after nearly 20 years leading the Burbank entertainment giant.
(Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)
Four internal candidates are vying for the job, including Dana Walden, co-chairman of Disney Entertainment, who oversees television and streaming and managed the Kimmel crisis with Iger.
Josh D’Amaro, Disney’s theme parks and experiences chief, is viewed by many as the leading contender.
Also in the CEO mix are ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro; and Disney Entertainment Co-Chairman Alan Bergman, who oversees movies, including the Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars franchises, and, in concert with Walden, entertainment streaming services.
“The next leader needs to be very attuned to how the company is perceived and valued by its customers and clients,” Hsieh said. “This is a moment for people to be very clear about their values.”
Disney’s values were questioned by many after the decision to yank Kimmel from the air.
As protesters buzzed around Disney’s Burbank headquarters and Kimmel’s darkened theater on Hollywood Boulevard, the voice of the company’s former chief rang out.
“Where has all the leadership gone?” Michael Eisner asked in a stinging Sept. 19 social media post. “If not for university presidents, law firm managing partners, and corporate chief executives standing up against bullies, who then will step up for the first amendment?”
Disney hadn’t formally addressed the situation. The only public message was a terse ABC statement on Sept. 17 — minutes after Iger and Walden moved to suspend the show: “ ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live’ will be pre-empted indefinitely.”
Kimmel was furious. It was about an hour to showtime and his studio audience was queued up outside the El Capitan Entertainment Centre. He had intended to clarify his words that night.
But Walden and Iger were worried the comedian was dug in, and his planned remarks would only inflame the situation.
Disney’s move to bench Jimmy Kimmel prompted protests, including days of demonstrations outside the El Capitan Entertainment Centre, where “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” is taped.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
What was initially viewed by Disney executives as a social media storm — vitriol from Trump supporters — had morphed into an existential threat for ABC when Carr, the FCC chairman, threatened to go after station licenses.
Carr urged other broadcasters to take a stand — a call heeded by Nexstar Media Group, which needs FCC approval for its proposed $6.2-billion takeover of a rival TV station owner, Tegna.
Nexstar pulled Kimmel’s program, followed by the politically conservative Sinclair Broadcast Group. The two companies own stations that provide 22% of ABC’s coverage.
Protesters called for a Disney boycott this month outside the darkened stage of ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ The comedian returned Sept. 23.
(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)
ABC’s ambiguous seven-word statement suggested to many that Kimmel wasn’t returning.
“Great News for America: The ratings challenged Jimmy Kimmel Show is CANCELLED,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform that night. “Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done.”
Disney executives privately said they were simply hitting pause. ABC executives and talent were getting death threats, according to one insider who was not authorized to discuss the situation. Later, in Sacramento, a gunman fired three shots into the lobby of an ABC-affiliated station. No one was injured.
But Disney’s initial response was roundly criticized for being weak, an abdication of the 1st Amendment. “To surrender our right to speak freely is to accept that those in power, not the people, will set the boundaries of debate that define a free society,” Anna M. Gomez, the sole Democrat FCC commissioner, said in a statement.
Executives defended the ABC statement, noting that anything Disney had said at that moment could have exacerbated its troubles with the FCC and station groups. One insider added that company also needed time to weigh whether it was worth bringing back the show.
Iger and Walden held a Sunday sit-down with Kimmel on Sept. 21 to clear the air. The following day, Disney announced his show would return.
“It wasn’t a reaction to any regulatory threats or political threats — it was an editorial decision because we felt the comments were ill-timed and, thus, insensitive given the topic,” Horacio Gutierrez, Disney’s chief legal and compliance officer, said in an interview Monday. “We felt our responsibility was to avoid further inflaming the situation during a very delicate and emotional time for the nation and that couldn’t be achieved in the heat of the moment.”
Gutierrez said narratives about Disney’s motives were inaccurate.
“The guidance we were given by Bob as we were thinking this through was to do the right thing, and that’s what we did in both preempting the show and in putting it back on the air,” he said. “Other people can comment about what they would have done or said … but the reality is the action of the company speaks louder than any words.”
Brian Frons, a former senior ABC executive and a UCLA Anderson School professor, said the way the crisis was handled reflected Iger’s measured leadership style.
“This situation could have turned into a firefight with the [Trump] administration — a direct confrontation,” Frons said. “It could have been Florida-Chapek all over again.”
Disney’s last major public relations debacle was in early 2022, when former Disney CEO Bob Chapek tumbled into a political quagmire with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Disney belatedly opposed a Florida law banning school conversations about sexual orientation, the so-called Don’t Say Gay bill, prompting DeSantis to retaliate with a takeover of a Central Florida land-use board overseeing development around Walt Disney World.
Chapek’s shaky handling of the Florida dispute, which led conservatives to declare the company had become “woke,” was among the reasons Disney board’s fired him in November 2022, returning Iger to the top job.
Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger (left) and Bob Chapek (right) who served 2 1/2 years as chief executive. Chapek was removed in November 2022 to make way for Iger’s return.
(Business Wire)
Chapek had been Iger’s hand-picked successor but lasted in the job just 2½ years as pandemic dealt a crushing blow to theme parks, movie theaters and sporting events.
“In our instant-response culture, we want managers to have an immediate response and confrontation,” Frons said. “Sometimes, the instant solution might not be the best one.”
The Kimmel crisis and Chapek’s stormy tenure hover over succession.
Disney’s Achilles’ heel has long been its leadership handoffs. Over the years, Iger postponed several planned retirements, prompting at least one prospective successor, Tom Staggs, to exit the company in frustration.
The switch to Iger from Eisner 20 years ago was even more tumultuous, a move made to tamp down a shareholder revolt.
Before Iger was in the wings, Eisner recruited Creative Arts Agency co-founder Michael Ovitz — a debacle that ended in a court battle and a $140-million Disney payout.
Walt Disney Co. Chairman James P. Gorman is the former chief executive of Morgan Stanley.
(China News Service / China News Service via Getty Images)
Last year, Disney turned to James P. Gorman, Morgan Stanley’s former executive chairman, to oversee the succession process amid past criticism that some board members were too deferential to Iger. (A source close to the company disputed that characterization.)
Gorman became chairman of Disney’s board in January. He’s credited with orchestrating a smooth transition at the bank where he served as CEO for 14 years.
Disney’s board has said it would consider internal and outside candidates when determining who’s best equipped to lead the $206-billion company.
Walden was viewed as the early favorite, but some believe that Trump’s election last November might have changed that. The 60-year-old television executive has long been supportive of Democrat causes and is a friend of former Vice President Kamala Harris.
Walden joined Disney in 2019 after Disney swallowed Rupert Murdoch’s Fox entertainment properties, including the Fox television and movie studios and a controlling stake in Hulu. She oversees ABC, ABC News, Disney Channel, National Geographic and, with Bergman, the streaming services.
It’s not clear whether the Kimmel controversy helped or hurt her chances. By the end of last week, both Nexstar and Sinclair had abandoned their boycotts, returning the show to their ABC-affiliated stations.
“If this situation holds, Dana may have proved herself as a very effective crisis manager,” Frons said.
Clockwise from top left: Alan Bergman, Josh D’Amaro, Dana Walden and Jimmy Pitaro.
(Evan Agostini, Chris Pizzello and Richard Shotwell / Invision via AP)
D’Amaro, the parks and experiences chief, is thought to have an edge. Neither Disney nor the board have signaled that there is a front-runner.
The 54-year-old executive runs Disney’s biggest and most prosperous unit — theme parks, resorts, cruise lines and experiences, including video games. D’Amaro is an architect of Disney’s $60-billion campaign to expand and revitalize its parks and resorts and double the number of cruise ships.
The charismatic D’Amaro brims with enthusiasm for Disney where he’s spent most of his adult life — more than 27 years.
Bergman, 59, is a savvy executive who runs Disney’s film studios, its major creative franchises, as well as theatrical and streaming releases and marketing. He oversees Disney Music Group and its Broadway show unit.
And Pitaro, the Connecticut-based ESPN chief, has helped lead Disney’s push to streaming as the once lucrative cable business has contracted. The 56-year-old executive, a former consumer products and Yahoo executive, has managed Disney’s dealings with the NFL, NBA and Major League Baseball.
Some worry that none of the candidates will match Iger’s skills.
“This idea that you’re going to replace the CEO — a person who is at the height of their power — with somebody in a similar place is pretty hard,” Frons said. “Instead, you have to ask: Who is the person who can best position Disney for the future in all the businesses that are important today and might be important in the future?”