After an uncommon 12 months in his late-night tenure, Jimmy Kimmel is formally sticking round for a short while longer.
The late-night host signed a one-year contract extension with ABC and “Jimmy Kimmel Stay!” will proceed by means of Could 2027. Kimmel’s earlier contract was set to finish in Could 2026, on the finish of the 2025-2026 tv season.
The extension, first reported by Bloomberg, comes just a few months after the community and its guardian firm, Walt Disney Co., suspended Kimmel following sharp backlash over feedback he made about conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s loss of life. Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcast Group, house owners of ABC associates, stated they might not air the sequence after Kimmel’s feedback hours earlier than the indefinite suspension was introduced.
Kimmel returned to the air after a virtually weeklong suspension, delivering an emotional monologue through which he ardently defended free speech. He didn’t explicitly apologize for his feedback, which Sinclair stated was a situation that needed to be met earlier than it will air the present once more, however each Nexstar and Sinclair resumed airing the present shortly after Kimmel returned.
Throughout his temporary day off the air, Kimmel discovered himself on the heart of a fiery tradition conflict. Speak present hosts, actors, comedians, writers and even the previous head of Disney condemned ABC’s determination to pause manufacturing, however a wave of critics celebrated Kimmel’s suspension, together with President Trump and Federal Communications Fee Chairman Brendan Carr, who had publicly urged ABC to behave on Kimmel’s feedback.
The late-night panorama has been the topic of a lot discourse about free speech since CBS introduced in July that it will not be renewing the storied community franchise “The Late Present With Stephen Colbert.” The choice, the corporate stated, was as a result of monetary causes and never — as many have speculated — due to Colbert’s criticism of a settlement between the Trump administration and Paramount, the guardian firm of CBS, over a “60 Minutes” interview with then-Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024.
Kimmel’s earlier contract extension in 2022 was good for 3 years, and it got here at a time of hypothesis over whether or not he’d proceed on with the present.
“Jimmy Kimmel Stay!” airs weeknights at 11:35/10:35 Central.
