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Jimmy Kimmel Defends ‘Widow’ Joke After Calls for His Dismissal
The comedian Jimmy Kimmel defended a joke he made two days before the White House correspondents’ dinner where he said that Melania Trump had “a glow like an expectant widow.” The first lady and President Trump both called on ABC to fire Kimmel over the joke.
“Trump, stay down.” “Stay down.” “This kind of rhetoric about the president, the first lady and his supporters is completely deranged. And it’s unbelievable that the American people are consuming it night after night after night. When you have people in positions of power that are saying things like this every single day for years, you are inspiring violence by people who are already mentally ill. And that’s what we’ve seen against this president for far too long.” “It was a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80 and she’s younger than I am. It was not, by any stretch of the definition, a call to assassination, and they know that. And also, I agree that hateful and violent rhetoric is something we should reject. I do, and I think a great place to start to dial that back would be to have a conversation with your husband about it.” “I think Disney and ABC are extremely lucky that Donald Trump wasn’t assassinated on Saturday. They would be very smart to get this guy off the air, especially when there’s so many non-political comedians that are good that could replace his show.” I’m just sick of the silliness coming out of the White House. I just wish that there were proper adults running the country at the moment who could stop with all these stupid distractions and this silly nonsense and just get back to governing the country.”
The comedian Jimmy Kimmel defended a joke he made two days before the White House correspondents’ dinner where he said that Melania Trump had “a glow like an expectant widow.” The first lady and President Trump both called on ABC to fire Kimmel over the joke.
By Axel Boada
April 28, 2026
