{"id":382277,"date":"2026-04-16T10:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T10:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/382277\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T10:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T10:02:11","slug":"jimmy-kimmel-delivers-epic-punch-to-vance-who-claimed-trumps-jesus-post-was-a-joke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/382277\/","title":{"rendered":"Jimmy Kimmel delivers epic punch to Vance who claimed Trump\u2019s Jesus post was a joke"},"content":{"rendered":"

Your support helps us to tell the story<\/p>\n

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n

Your support makes all the difference.Read more<\/p>\n

Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel <\/a>blasted Vice President JD Vance <\/a>for defending Donald Trump after the president posted<\/a> an AI-generated image online which portrayed him as Jesus.<\/p>\n

Trump shared the image on Truth Social Sunday after dubbing Pope Leo XIV as \u201cWEAK\u201d on crime, following the pontiff\u2019s criticism of the U.S. war with Iran.<\/a> The AI image showed Trump wearing robes and healing a sick man with beams of light coming from his hands. <\/p>\n

The post received fierce backlash from Christians and political figures on both sides of the aisle. Trump took the image down Monday, claiming that he thought it had portrayed him as a doctor, not Jesus.<\/p>\n

Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, subsequently claimed the image was \u201ca joke\u201d during an interview with Fox News\u2019 Bret BaierMonday. \u200bBut Kimmel was having none of the excuses.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump is doing his best to upset every faction of Christianity,\u201d the Jimmy Kimmel Live! host said Tuesday. \u201cAfter he lambasted the pope, he posted an image of himself as Jesus, and then when everyone got mad, he said, \u2018Oh I didn\u2019t know that was Jesus, I thought that was me as a doctor healing people,\u2019 which is so lame. Not one person believes it. It is quite clearly an image of Jesus with his dumb head on it.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"KimmelKimmel said \u2018not one person\u2019 believes Trump\u2019s excuse for sharing an image that portrayed the president as Jesus (Jimmy Kimmel Live!)\"TheThe post received fierce backlash from Christians and political figures on both sides of the aisle. Trump took the image down Monday, claiming that he thought it had portrayed him as a doctor, not Jesus (@realDonaldTrump\/Truth Social)<\/p>\n

Kimmel noted that not even Vance was \u201cable to go along with this doctor storyline,\u201d and was forced to come up with an entirely different narrative. <\/p>\n

The late-night host then played a clip of Vance on Fox News. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think the president was posting a joke, and of course he took it down because he recognized that a lot of people weren\u2019t understanding his humor in that case,\u201d the vice president claimed. <\/p>\n

Kimmel then said: \u201cHe was posting a joke, you understand? And like all the best jokes, it had to be explained and then deleted. First, he was Jesus. Then he wasn\u2019t Jesus, he was a doctor. And now, it was a joke.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cWhy did I get kicked off the air again? I can\u2019t remember.\u201d <\/p>\n

Kimmel\u2019s show was suspended in September over comments he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was shot and killed during a live debate on a Utah college campus.<\/p>\n

During the show, Kimmel said that the MAGA world was \u201cdesperately 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.\u201d <\/p>\n

ABC brought Jimmy Kimmel Live! back on air the following week. <\/p>\n

\"PresidentPresident Donald Trump claimed he thought the image he shared online depicted him as a doctor, not Jesus (Getty)<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Trump seems unfazed by the Jesus image furor. On Wednesday, the president shared another image on Truth Social that showed Jesus giving him a hug<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The new image, which appeared to be AI-generated, shows Jesus with an arm around Trump\u2019s shoulder and one hand on his chest. The two are standing in front of a halo of light and an American flag, and have their heads leaning against each other. <\/p>\n

Trump captioned the image: \u201cThe Radical Left Lunatics might not like this, but I think it is quite nice!!! President DJT.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[156,111,139,69,437],"class_list":{"0":"post-382277","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz","12":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}