Jimmy Kimmel remains off the air, following a meeting with Disney executives that reportedly didn’t go well. Maybe he’ll never come back.
“So what? It’s 2025. Why doesn’t he just go to a streamer or the internet?”
I’ve heard a lot of that the last few days — from colleagues, pundits, and people like Bill Simmons, who has worked for Disney multiple times — including as a writer for Kimmel — and went on to launch his own company, to great success.
There are two answers to that. The first one is short: Yes, Jimmy Kimmel could absolutely go to the internet and start podcasting or streaming or whatever he wanted to do. He could set up shop immediately.
The second one is where it gets murky: Yes, Jimmy Kimmel doesn’t need to be on TV anymore. But in 2025, going to the internet — whether it’s his own thing that he sets up for himself, or a deal with a streamer or a podcast network, isn’t a cure-all.
Because the internet isn’t a magic safe space. It doesn’t shield you from politics — and it definitely doesn’t shield you from a White House that’s decided you’re an enemy.
It is true that Brendan Carr, the Federal Communications Commission head who encouraged Disney and ABC broadcast stations to “take action” against Kimmel, doesn’t have the authority to regulate what happens on the internet. (Though the Project 2025 chapter that Carr wrote about the FCC says the agency should try to influence Big Tech companies, anyway.)
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But as we’ve noted before, the Trump administration continually tries to find novel legal challenges and avenues to change the behavior of institutions it wants to control.
And when that fails, there’s just brute force. In August, Trump demanded that Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan resign because of his ties to China; within weeks, Trump had a deal that gave the US a 10% stake in Intel.
So that means if Kimmel hung out his own shingle, to, say, start a podcast, he’d still be vulnerable to political and legal pressure — if Trump wanted to focus on the companies that worked with him.
That same dynamic could also depress the market for any company that would think of signing Kimmel to a big-money deal, like the ones that Amazon, Netflix, and others have offered to some talkers. The same goes for potential advertisers: Yes, Kimmel could draw a big audience — but would it be worth the possibility of a Bud Light-style pressure campaign, egged on by the White House?
Because Kimmel’s problem isn’t the FCC, or even ABC. It’s that the most powerful person in the country has decided he’s an enemy. And in 2025, there isn’t a platform — TV, streaming, or podcasting — that can guarantee protection from that kind of pressure.
The internet may be bigger than broadcast. In the new Trump era, it may not be safer.
