After a gunman opened fire from a nearby rooftop on an ICE facility in Dallas—killing one detainee, injuring two others in a transport van, and then taking his own life—Fox News host Bill Hemmer shocked critics by pinning blame on late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, faulting him for not apologizing for remarks he’d made about Charlie Kirk.
Kimmel's show returned after ABC announced it would end its suspension of the program just a week after Trump pushed to get Kimmel off the air. Trump has since threatened ABC with legal action, claiming he was told by the network that the show was "cancelled."
The shooter's exact motivation is not known; journalist Ken Klippenstein reported that even the shooter's friends had trouble understanding their ideology. But FBI Director Kash Patel released an image of bullets with "ANTI-ICE" written on them, which Fox News hosts seized on as an example of the regular "threats" ICE agents face while meeting the president's directives.
And Hemmer, with no evidence whatsoever, was quick to suggest there is a through line between Kimmel's remarks about MAGA looking to score "political points" by tying Kirk's killing to leftists and yesterday's shooting:
“This is why Jimmy Kimmel needed to say, ‘I’m sorry.' And he didn’t. And he needs to."
"He needs to call Erica Kirk and talk to her. And he needs to go on his program and say, 'I had this lovely conversation with this grieving widow. And this is what we discussed.' That’s the proper way you manage this. And that did not happen.”
You can hear what he said in the video below.
People were quick to call out Hemmer's remarks.
Hemmer did not mention that Kimmel, in his monologue on Tuesday night, said Erika Kirk's eulogy to her late husband "touched me deeply."
Kimmel said:
“On Sunday, Erika Kirk forgave the man who shot her husband. She forgave him. That is an example we should follow."
"If you believe in the teachings of Jesus, as I do, there it was. That’s it. A selfless act of grace, forgiveness from a grieving widow. It touched me deeply.”
Kimmel was also critical of the government interference that led to his suspension, saying that Trump "celebrates Americans losing their livelihoods because he can’t take a joke" and is now "openly rooting for NBC to fire Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers and the hundreds of Americans who work for their shows who don’t make millions of dollars.”
