00:00In the United States, the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel's late-night TV show has sparked concerns for the state of freedom of speech in the nation.
00:09More on this, the ABC network suspended the program on Tuesday following the host's comments about the assassination of the far-right activist Charlie Kirk on September 10th.
00:20The measure has been denounced by several organizations as a blatant assault on freedom of expression, with fellow late-night show hosts firing fury remarks at ABC's parent company Disney and the Federal Communications Commission.
00:36The action, which has also sparked protests outside the network's headquarters in Los Angeles and New York, has been widely regarded as part of a broader trend where major media companies are increasingly aligning with right-wing views supported by Trump to protect their business interests at the expense of free speech.
00:57Trump has been threatening Kimmel for years.
01:07He pressured him to get Colbert off the air.
01:12He said Kimmel was next, so it's not a surprise, but it is like a gut punch.
01:18It is a huge escalation.
01:20The Writers Guild is determined.
01:22We stand in solidarity with not only our fellow writers, but with everybody.
01:26We make our living with our words, right?
01:28We know the value of words, and this is a chilling effect.
01:32Jimmy Kimmel being, having his show preempted by ABC because of comments that he made that the president disagreed with is part of a larger pattern of Trump's fascist regime.
01:43We as Americans have to accept the fact that we have fascism in the United States right now.
01:48And in this context, Senate Democrats introduced a bill on Thursday to protect free speech while decrying Kimmel's suspension.
02:00Let's listen.
02:01Last night, they showed us exactly how serious they are.
02:09Trump's FCC forced a major network to pull a loud Trump critic, Jimmy Kimmel, off the air,
02:16essentially saying that any media actor that doesn't say what Trump wants them to say about Charlie Kirk or Trump's policies is going to be silenced.
02:25That's censorship.
02:28That's state speech control.
02:30That's not America.
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