00:07If they don't like it, they can give him the ax.
00:11But when the FCC says,
00:14we can do this the easy way or the hard way,
00:17and they make it clear that there will be retaliation,
00:21retribution against ABC.
00:23Licenses pulled.
00:24I mean, I went to law school.
00:27I taught law school.
00:28That is such a clear violation in my head of the First Amendment.
00:33What say you?
00:35I think it's all troubling, right, at the end of the day.
00:37I think it's troubling what he said.
00:38I think it was right for them to suspend Jimmy Kimmel for his comments.
00:42But I am of the perspective that if he gets taken off the air,
00:46it should be for a business decision and a business decision alone.
00:50We do have to be very protective of free speech in this country,
00:53always have to be vigilantly watchful of our freedoms,
00:57because as our forefathers have told us for eons,
01:01they can erode in less than a lifetime.
01:03And so I think you got to look at it.
01:05You've got to say, hey, look,
01:06if Jimmy Kimmel's ratings are down 50% over the last four years,
01:09it's got to be purely a business decision.
01:11And I think that's the only answer here.
01:14I think certainly his comments can be condemned.
01:18And I think the hundreds of thousands of social media posts and commentary that we've seen since the death of Charlie Kirk,
01:24Americans celebrating his death, particularly, and this is what I really have just a hard time understanding,
01:30as educators all across our country, the folks who are responsible for educating the next generation of Americans.
01:36We do have to be responsible and we have to be respectful of our words.
01:40But we also have to understand that we do have free speech in this country.
01:44I think that daylight is the very best disinfectant.
01:48Let's get those words out for everybody to see and come to their own conclusions.
01:52And ultimately, we've got to make business decisions here, not governmental decisions.
01:57Trump was saying that, you know, 97% of what the media says is hating Trump and he's sick of it and he wants to stop it.
02:08And that aligns with what this FCC chairman is saying.
02:13It feels like the FCC chairman is taking his cue from Donald Trump.
02:17And I just think back, I don't have to think back very far, but in particular,
02:21Bill Clinton, when he was involved in that sexual scandal with Monica Lewinsky,
02:27he was annihilated every night on late night television.
02:31So under that theory, Jay Leno should have been taken off.
02:36And all the other late night hosts should have been taken off.
02:39That's what late night comedians do.
02:42They did it to Jimmy Carter. They did it to George Bush.
02:45They did it to Bill Clinton. They did it to Lyndon Johnson.
02:48My entire life, they did it to the person in power.
02:52And it was always accepted until now. What's different?
02:56I think that there's a different level of vitriol towards Donald Trump.
02:59And that's across the board.
03:01And we've had this since he came on the political scene back in 2015.
03:04He's never had the same shake that anyone else has been afforded in politics.
03:09Now, that's not to say that you can't make fun of the guy.
03:12You can't call a spade a spade that we cannot honestly hold to account the folks who are representing our government at whatever level they might be.
03:24But I do think very clearly Donald Trump has been treated in a very different way.
03:29And the way that that has ultimately created outcomes in this country is that people have tried to kill him.
03:37But with Donald Trump, they're calling him a racist, a fascist, a misogynist.
03:41They're calling him a threat to democracy.
03:43You have to understand that there's a different level of outcome that comes from these types of characterizations that ultimately is leading to increased violence in our country.
03:54That is what I think we're talking about here.
03:57But that being said, look, I'm in agreeance with you guys.
04:00We have to protect free speech.
04:01We have to protect all of the freedoms that we enjoy in this country.
04:04If we're not vigilant about them, we will lose them.
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