Washington Examiner columnist Joe Concha said late-night host Jimmy Kimmel is “incapable” of apologizing, after Kimmel made a controversial joke calling first lady Melania Trump an “expectant widow” ahead of the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, where there was an assassination attempt on President Donald Trump.
After Kimmel’s first show back Monday night since Trump called for his firing, Concha said the late-night host “double-downed.”
“He is incapable of apologizing for his open wish that Donald Trump be assassinated,” Concha said Tuesday on Fox & Friends First.
At the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday, officials said a gunman ran through a security checkpoint toward the ballroom where Trump and other attendees gathered for the annual event. Cole Allen was charged on Monday with attempting to assassinate the president.
Kimmel said the joke was not a call for assassination, but a “roast” about the age difference between the first couple.
“It was a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80, and she’s younger than I am,” Kimmel said. “It was not by any stretch of the definition a call to assassination.”
Concha said Kimmel’s comments about the first family show the late-night host wants the president to be assassinated.
“What else could any reasonable, sane, or sober person possibly conclude except that being a call for Trump, who works as hard as anybody on the planet, appears to be in excellent health, to be suddenly dead,” Concha said.
Concha said Kimmel shares similarities with progressive streamer Hasan Piker.
“Jimmy Kimmel is not a comedian, he’s Hasan Piker with an ABC logo,” Concha said. “And ABC, which might as well be called MSABC at this point, just gave this man a contract extension because that is what management wants this network to be.”
“The tip of the sphere in the radical Trump resistance,” he added of ABC. “Congrats guys, you just earned that distinction.”
JIMMY KIMMEL ADDRESSES MELANIA TRUMP’S SOCIAL MEDIA POST ABOUT HIS ‘CORROSIVE’ COMEDY SKIT
Concha said ABC went from being the “home” of great journalists to having Kimmel be the “face” of the network.
“The guy who cried on the air the night after Trump won back the White House,” Concha said. “This is not a comedian. This is a radical activist, and the fact that he openly wished for the president to be dead and tried to explain it away as, ‘oh, you know it’s about the age difference.’”
“Come on. Give me a break. What a joke,” he continued. “Except this guy rarely tells jokes on his show at this point. It’s all about taking down Trump one way or another.”
