Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel had advice for First Lady Melania Trump after she demanded his firing for referring to her as an "expectant widow" days before the shooting that disrupted the White House Correspondents' Association dinner.
Kimmel's joke came days before a security scare at the Washington Hilton, where the Trumps and senior officials were quickly moved to safety after shots rang out outside the ballroom. Investigators believe the suspect fired one or two rounds. The Secret Service returned fire but missed, and the suspect was later apprehended near a staircase leading into the ballroom.
He said, while roasting the Trumps during a mock White House Correspondents' Association dinner segment:
"Our First Lady, Melania, is here. Look at her, so beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow."
You can hear what he said in the video below.
Mrs. Trump later condemned Kimmel's "hateful and violent rhetoric" in a post on X, saying his joke "is intended to divide our country." She called his words "corrosive," and called on ABC to "take a stand" beccause he "shouldn't have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate."
Responding to her post, Kimmel said on his program that the joke was about the "age difference" between her and the president, who turns 80 in June. He pointed out he could not have called for the president to be assassinated when he made the joke several days before the dinner and subsequent shooting took place.
He said:
"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 a call to assassination and they know that I've been very vocal for many years, speaking out against gun violence in particular."
"I am sorry that you and the president and everyone in that room on Saturday went through that. I really am. Just because no one got killed doesn't meant it wasn't traumatic and scary. And we should come together and be best. We really should."
"But if you want us to believe that a joke I made three days before this dinner had any effect on anything that happened, well maybe you should look into this psychic lady, too."
Kimmel then showed a clip of White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt joking in a Fox News interview ahead of the Correspondents' dinner that there would be "some shots fired in the room tonight."
And he addressed Mrs. Trump's criticism of his "hateful and violent rhetoric":
"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."
You can hear what he said in the video below.
Many concurred.
Melania Trump's call for Kimmel to be fired is just the latest twist in Kimmel's relationship with the White House.
In September, ABC announced it would end its suspension of Jimmy Kimmel Live! just a week after Trump pushed to get Kimmel off the air following comments Kimmel made about the assassination of far-right activist Charlie Kirk. ABC had had internal discussions with Disney, which saw a wave of subscriber cancellations in the wake of Kimmel's suspension.
When Kimmel returned, he called out 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.”
Critics have noted that although Trump has portrayed himself as a champion of free expression, his second term has featured efforts to settle scores with critics—highlighted by his public celebration of Stephen Colbert’s show not being renewed by CBS and the removal of Kimmel from the air.
