Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel said ABC will not air an upcoming interview with James Talarico during his high-stakes campaign for U.S. Senate in Texas due to pressure from the Federal Communications Commission.
During his monologue Wednesday night, Kimmel said his interview with the Democrat Talarico Thursday evening would appear on YouTube instead of TV in an unusual break from his show’s norms. The scuttled TV appearance comes at the height of Talarico’s race against Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and would be his second-late night interview that fails to air this year after CBS made the same move with his interview on “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.”
“If you want to learn about a candidate for the Senate tomorrow, you will have to go to the Jimmy Kimmel Live! YouTube channel, where you will see it in its entirety,” Kimmel told his audience. “And thank goodness we have that because in the America we live in right now, that is the best that we can do, until November of course.”
Kimmel said the FCC threatened him, ABC and its affiliated TV stations “based on simple traditional editorial decisions — guest bookings it would seem they don’t like.” He said the decision to post the interview on YouTube came “out of consideration for our local stations,” especially those in Texas.
The Chronicle has reached out to the FCC, Talarico’s campaign and Paxton’s campaign for more information.
Kimmel included President Donald Trump in his blame and said the response from “his FCC” altered past precedent on his show, where he’s interviewed Hillary Clinton, Ted Cruz and Trump before his first presidential election in 2016.
“When (Trump) was the one sitting next to me, he seemed to have no problem with the idea of talk show hosts interviewing candidates,” Kimmel said before cueing up some sarcasm. “In fact, he was very eager to come back for another interview, which he did just before he became the nominee in 2016. But for some reason, and I can’t seem to figure out what that reason is, something has changed.”
The Chronicle has requested comment from the White House.
Talarico’s first late-night TV appearance on CBS was set to come in February, but Colbert said the network started enforcing an FCC requirement for talk shows to follow an “equal time” rule that ensures “comparable time and placement” for dueling candidates on broadcast TV and radio. That interview was also posted on YouTube as Colbert bashed the FCC and his own network for the decision.
This story may be updated.