The View finally addresses fellow ABC host Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension, clarifies ‘silence’: ‘We’re still here’

After two episodes of silence, the women of The View finally addressed the suspension of fellow ABC star Jimmy Kimmel.

“Now, look, did y’all really think we weren’t gonna talk about Jimmy Kimmel?” Whoopi Goldberg said at the start of Monday’s show, drawing laughs from her cohosts. “I mean, have you watched this show over the last 29 seasons? So you know no one silences us.”

Goldberg assured her friends in Italy, who had reached out with concern, that “we’re still here” and “still broadcasting.” She explained why they waited before commenting.

“When the news broke last week about Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension, we took a breath to see if Jimmy was going to say anything about it first. We did the same thing with Stephen Colbert,” she said, pointing to the cancellation of The Late Show in July. “Then our show was on tape on Friday. But we are live here today and we’re getting into it now.”

ABC suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live indefinitely on Wednesday after the late-night host criticized the “MAGA gang” over how it responded to Tyler Robinson, the suspect in the Sept. 10 assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Kimmel has not spoken publicly about the suspension.

On his show, Kimmel said, “We had some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and with everything they can to score political points from it.”

The suspension came shortly after FCC chair Brendan Carr appeared on a podcast, calling on affiliates to drop the program and urging Disney to punish Kimmel for what he described as “some of the sickest conduct possible.”

Goldberg pushed back strongly. “To be clear: you can not like a show and it can go off the air. Someone can say something they shouldn’t and get taken off the air. But the government cannot — cannot — apply pressure to force someone to be silenced,” she said.

Clips then played showing Sens. Rand Paul, Chris Murphy, and Ted Cruz all criticizing Carr’s actions. “Both sides and the middle of the aisle are saying, ‘You don’t do this. This is not how we work,’” Goldberg noted. “But you know who still doesn’t have a clear message about all of this?”

The show then played a clip of President Donald Trump suggesting Carr should decide whether programs “against me” should keep their licenses.

Goldberg responded sharply: “No it’s not up to Brendan Carr! It is not up to him! I don’t understand how you are the man in charge of the nation and you still don’t know how the First Amendment works.” She turned to cohost Sunny Hostin for legal clarity.

“Freedom of speech undergirds our democracy and our founders were very, very clear on that,” Hostin explained. “Our founders drafted the First Amendment specifically to protect the rights of citizens who criticize the government.”

She reminded viewers that the Supreme Court has “time and time again reinforced” the First Amendment’s protections. “The president of the United States should know what freedom of speech means,” she added.

Ana Navarro thanked viewers for “demanding truth and courage from us,” before calling it “ironic” that Kirk, who supported free speech, is now being used to “cancel” others.

“This is what dictators and authoritarians do! It does not matter the ideology,” Navarro warned, drawing on her experience growing up under both right-wing and left-wing dictatorships in Nicaragua. “At first, they come for the people with big platforms. At first, they silence the press. But then they come for all of us. Because their intent is to scare us into silence and self-censorship.”

Navarro also pointed to past actions from the Trump administration, such as barring the Associated Press from the Oval Office and cutting funding for NPR and PBS, as examples of attacks on free speech. “A bully always comes back for more,” she said, urging media leaders and voters alike to stand up.

After a break, Alyssa Farah Griffin added that people should think about the long-term impact of these decisions.

“Donald Trump is not going to be in power for 100 years. It may feel that way to a lot of people right now,” she said. “There will be a time that the left is back in power and I think the same conservatives that are backing this position, this crackdown on free speech, do not want a left-wing president policing what can be said on TV. Think about the precedent it sets down the road.”

Goldberg closed by reminding viewers that voters ultimately hold the power. “We make these decisions,” she said, promising that The View will continue to “fight for everybody’s right to have freedom of speech.”

The View airs weekdays on ABC.