The Dictatorship
Kimmel suspended as Trump’s pressure leads to a late-night shake-up
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has used threats, lawsuits and government pressure as he remakes the American media landscape, unleashing his long-standing grievances against an industry that has mocked, criticized and scorned him for years.
He’s extracted multimillion-dollar settlements, forced companies into costly litigation and prompted changes to programming that he found objectionable.
Now Trump is escalating his campaign of censure and retaliation, invigorated by successful efforts to push ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel off the air for his commentary on conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One while returning from Great Britain on Thursday, Trump said federal regulators should consider revoking broadcast licenses for networks that “give me only bad publicity.”
“All they do is hit Trump,” he said. “They’re licensed! They’re not allowed to do that. They’re an arm of the Democrat Party.”
Brendan CarrTrump’s handpicked head of the Federal Communications Commission, issued a similar warning the previous day while criticizing Kimmel’s remarks about the political ideology of the suspected assassin.
“We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Carr said. “These companies can find ways to change conduct, to take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”
ABC suspended Kimmel hours later.
It was the kind of brute force response that Trump and his loyalists have routinely flexed since the Republican president returned to the White House with a vow to retaliate against critics and political opponents. Trump’s reach has extended deep into the private sector, using the apparatus of the federal government to pressure companies to make changes that can reshape the public dialogue.
Critics fear crackdowns on free speech
Trump has already reached settlements with ABC and CBS over their coverage. He has filed defamation lawsuits against The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. Republicans in Congress stripped federal funding from NPR and PBS. At the FCC, Carr has used his influence to target diversity, equity and inclusion programs and to root out what he describes as liberal bias.
In the aftermath of Kirk’s assassination, Trump has clamped down more firmly, with broader implications for the future of free speech protections that have been a bedrock of the American political system.
Attorney General Pam Bondi recently said that “we will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.” Her words alarmed advocates who fear an elastic definition of the term could be used to criminalize dissent.
The First Amendment is widely viewed as protecting even the most disparaging remarks, and the Supreme Court said in an unanimous opinion last year that “government officials cannot attempt to coerce private parties in order to punish or suppress views that the government disfavors.”
Bondi later revised her comments to say she was focused on “hate speech that crosses the line into threats of violence.”
Todd Blanche, Bondi’s deputy, suggested that protesters could have violated the law by yelling at Trump while he visited a restaurant near the White House.
“Is it sheer happenstance that individuals show up at a restaurant where the president is trying to enjoy dinner in Washington, D.C., and accost him with vile words and vile anger?” Blanche said. He said authorities could investigate whether it’s “part of an organized effort to inflict harm and terror and damage to the United States.”
Politics and comedy collide on late-night shows
The latest saga with Kimmel began Monday night with the comedian’s commentary about last week’s shooting of Kirk, which took place on a college campus in Utah.
“We hit 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 doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said. He also compared Trump’s grief to “how a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish.”
Trump allies said Kimmel was falsely suggesting that the shooter was right-wing. Authorities have not formally presented a motive for the killing, but evidence indicates that he held liberal beliefs. Gov. Spencer Cox, R-Utah, has said “there clearly was a leftist ideology,”
On Wednesday, Carr appeared on a podcast hosted by Benny Johnson, a conservative commentator, and accused Kimmel of the “sickest conduct possible.” Carr said “you could make a strong argument that this is sort of an intentional effort to mislead the American people about a very core fundamental fact.”
Carr placed the move against Kimmel in the broader context of Trump’s efforts to undermine the power of legacy media companies.
“He smashed the facade that they get to control what we say, what we think, the narrative around events,” Carr said. “And we’re seeing a lot of consequences from President Trump doing that.”
Reminding affiliates that their broadcast licenses come with an “obligation to operate in the public interest,” Carr said “it’s time for them to step up” and say Kimmel’s content “isn’t something that we think serves the needs of our local communities.”
Kimmel faces corporate backlash
It didn’t take long for Nexstar Media Group, the country’s biggest operator of television stations, to echo some of Carr’s language.
“Continuing to give Mr. Kimmel a broadcast platform in the communities we serve is simply not in the public interest at the current time,” Andrew Alford, president of Nexstar’s broadcasting division, said in statement.
The controversy landed at a sensitive time for Nexstar, which needs FCC approval for its $6.2 billion acquisition of Tegna.
ABC soon announced that Kimmel would be taken off the air. It is unclear when or whether he will return. Kimmel has not commented publicly.
Later in the evening, the television company Sinclair said its stations would carry “a special in remembrance of Charlie Kirk” on Friday during Kimmel’s usual time slot. The company also asked Kimmel to apologize to Kirk’s family and donate money to Turning Point USA, the conservative group that Kirk turned into a political powerhouse.
House Democratic leaders, in a statement, accused Carr of “bullying ABC” and “forcing the company to bend the knee to the Trump administration,” and said a “war” on the First Amendment by Trump and the GOP “is blatantly inconsistent with American values.”
The news of Kimmel’s suspension broke after midnight in Britain, where Trump was traveling for a state visit. But the president soon posted on Truth Social, his social media platform, to celebrate what he called “Great News for America.”
CBS had already announced the cancellation of Stephen Colbert’s show over the summer, and Trump said more dominoes should fall, calling for the cancellation of shows by Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers.
“Do it NBC!!!” he wrote.
___
This story corrects the spelling of Nexstar.
Today’s edition of quick hits.
* Stay tuned: “After a week of strikes between Iran and U.S. forces, President Donald Trump said the two countries are finalizing an agreement to end the war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. He said that a possible deal could be signed ‘maybe over the weekend in Europe.’”
* In related news: “On a background call with reporters, a senior administration official placed their confidence about a deal being reached at ‘80%, 85%’ and added that leaders ‘expect to be signing this agreement over the next few days.’”
* This ruling extends a related court order from two weeks ago: “A federal judge in Virginia on Friday extended her block on the Trump administration’s $1.8 billion compensation fund for individuals who believe they were victims of an alleged ‘weaponized’ federal government.”
* At the Kennedy Center: “A federal judge on Friday struck down a last-ditch attempt by the Kennedy Center’s board to keep President Donald Trump’s name on the building.”
* The White House was no doubt far more satisfied with these proceedings: “A federal judge refused to halt the UFC Freedom 250 cage fights set for this weekend at the White House, despite a lawsuit that called the event a ‘volcano of corruption’ that will mark ‘the first private, for-profit sporting event ever held on White House grounds.’”
* The administration continues to find new ways to make Vladimir Putin happy: “The United States plans to significantly reduce the aircraft and warships that it makes available for NATO operations in Europe, according to two senior European officials, accelerating America’s effort to scale down the protection it has offered to European allies for eight decades.”
* Remember when Trump pretended to express sympathy for Iranian dissidents and activists? “The Trump administration is preparing to deport nearly two dozen people to the Central African Republic on Thursday, including at least two Iranian women who had sought refuge in the United States, according to lawyers and a government official. The flight, which is also expected to include migrants from Afghanistan and Syria, would mark the first such deportation to the Central African Republic, a deeply impoverished country that has been plagued by conflict.”
* On the National Mall: “Federal authorities are investigating the origin of large writings spelling out ‘86 47’ that appeared Thursday on the National Mall lawn. U.S. Park Police responded to a report of vandalism on the west lawn of the Washington Monument, where the numbers ‘86 47’ were marked in the grass.”
* Already? “When renovations of the Reflecting Pool were completed last week, President Donald Trump praised its ‘beautiful, clean water.’ Under his predecessors, Trump said, the pool was ‘Terrible. Disgusting … garbage ridden.’ Now, days after the pool was refilled, clumps of green algae have been spotted throughout the water.”
* This whole endeavor has suffered a series of embarrassments: “The Trump Mobile T1 phone, originally marketed as ‘Made in the USA,’ is nearly identical to the two-year-old HTC U24 Pro, a phone made by the Taiwanese company HTC using Chinese parts, according to a technical analysis the repair-guide and parts company iFixit conducted in partnership with NBC News.”
* I feel this one serves as a compelling metaphor: “President Donald Trump vows to ‘make America healthy again.’ But one of Trump’s golf courses risked making patrons sick, New York state health records indicate. A Dutchess County health inspector flagged the Trump National Golf Club Hudson Valley in Hopewell Junction, New York, for a ‘critical violation’ at its restaurant, according to New York State Department of Health inspection records from April 16.”
Have a safe weekend.
Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”
DETROIT (AP) — The opening of a Canadian-U.S. bridge across the Detroit River, which President Donald Trump had previously threatened to block, was delayed Thursday due to unresolved issues.
In a statement released before a scheduled Friday ribbon-cutting ceremony at the bridge, the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority said that “Canada and the United States have agreed to delay the opening of the bridge, taking the necessary time to resolve any outstanding issues.” It didn’t elaborate on what those issues are or how long the delay would last.
The 1.5-mile-long (2.4-kilometer-long) Gordie Howe International Bridge spans the Detroit River and connects the Motor City with Windsor, Ontario. The bridge is jointly owned by Canada and Michigan and was expected to open to traffic later this month.
But the opening had been thrown into question after Trump in February demanded in a social media post that Canada turn over at least half of the bridge’s ownership to the U.S. federal government and agree to other unspecified demands in one of the Republican president’s many salvos over cross-border trade issues.
Michigan officials and the White House had been in contact for months about the bridge following Trump’s post, with the understanding that the opening would move forward Friday. Invitations for the bridge’s opening went out this week following a conversation between Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.
“This project is a powerful example of bipartisan and international cooperation, and the governor looks forward to attending the ribbon-cutting ceremony when it happens,” a statement from Whitmer spokesperson Bobby Leddy said.
New bridge a “long-term play”
Internal disagreements within the Trump administration threw those plans into question, as Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick pushed back on the opening, according to two people with knowledge of the matter who insisted on anonymity to discuss the private talks.
The White House did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday evening, “At the request of the United States we agreed to delay the opening and take the necessary time to resolve outstanding issues.”
He added, “There are some things that have been raised, a series of technical aspects, which we will work through with the United States.”
Even with the delay, officials remained optimistic that the bridge — a roughly $4.4 billion project — is still expected to open.
“We need to keep this very much in perspective,” said Sandy Baruah, president of the Detroit Regional Chamber and former U.S. assistant secretary of commerce. “Our organization, the state of Michigan and others have been working on this bridge for 20 years. If it opens July 1, Aug. 1 or Sept. 1, I’m not going to get overly agitated about it. This is a long-term play.”
Named after the late Canadian Hockey great Gordie Howe, who spent 25 seasons leading the Detroit Red Wings, the bridge is expected to be another vital economic artery between Canada and the United States.
The construction project was negotiated by Rick Snyder, the former Republican governor of Michigan, and paid for by Canada to help ease congestion at the existing Ambassador Bridge and the Detroit-Windsor tunnel. Work has been underway since 2018.
U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a Michigan Democrat, said she’s taking people at their word that the holdup is “a minor hiccup.”
“This is probably the most bipartisan issue in the state of Michigan, so it’s ridiculous that we can’t just seal the deal,” Slotkin said.
Commerce and border crossings
Detroit and Windsor have been neighborly for generations, with residents in both countries frequently crossing the shared river border for entertainment and shopping. Windsor’s population in 2021 was about 230,000. Like Detroit, the Canadian city’s economy has a strong focus on manufacturing and the auto industry.
Commercial trade between the two cities primarily has been across the nearly century-old and privately-owned Ambassador Bridge, which is closer to downtown Detroit than the Gordie Howe Bridge.
The Ambassador Bridge had been the busiest commercial border crossing between the United States and Canada until last year, when truck traffic along the Blue Water Bridge connecting Port Huron, Michigan, to Sarnia, Ontario, surpassed the Ambassador Bridge’s numbers, according to the Bridge and Tunnel Operators Association.
In 2025, about 2.1 million trucks crossed the Blue Water Bridge compared to just over 1.8 million that used the Ambassador Bridge. About 3.5 million passenger vehicles used the Ambassador Bridge last year, while 1.6 million crossed via the Blue Water Bridge.
Combined, more than 9.2 million vehicles crossed the border on those two bridges in 2025, according to the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics.
More than 3.7 million cars and SUVs also traveled between the United States and Canada last year via the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel.
Both bridges and the tunnel are working at full capacity, and the new bridge will help improve the efficiency of commercial and personal traffic between the two countries, Baruah said.
“This is what government is supposed to do, make it easier for business to conduct commerce,” he said.
___
Cappelletti reported from Washington.
President Donald Trump’s planned UFC fight on the White House’s South Lawn has required a monumental effort from more than seven federal agencies, hundreds of staff working onsite daily and at least $60 million, according to a legal filing that offers a glimpse into the preparations.
The event is part of the 250th anniversary of America’s founding, and is scheduled for the weekend with the main attraction — seven mixed martial arts matches — on Sunday.
That is, if a judge doesn’t halt the proceedings, which is sought by two Virginia residents in a federal lawsuit against the National Park Service, which oversees the South Lawn.
The agency filed a rebuff of the request Tuesday in court, and, in it, laid out the operations for the event.
“Well over $60 million and tens of thousands of hours of labor have been expended,” the document read, adding that the money came from the UFC and groups affiliated with it.
The Octagon
It’s the eight-sided cage that surrounds the sometimes bloodied combatants and sits at the center of the constructed arena on the South Lawn.
The arena is expected to hold 4,000 spectators, with another 120,000 visitors — who swung tickets from an online lottery — anticipated to watch from the nearby Ellipse.
The installation began May 20, and the Secret Service worked with the UFC to screen between 20 and 30 trucks of equipment — as well as between “700 and 900” staff — that came in daily for the installation.
The document did not specify the extent of government resources spent on the project, but said seven agencies, including Homeland Security and the Federal Aviation Administration, have “allocated significant resources and manpower.”
The schedule
It’ll kick off Saturday with a ceremonial weigh-in at the Ellipse, followed by a concert by country musicians The Zac Brown Band.
A UFC Freedom 250 Fan Fest will be ongoing through the weekend, with “interactive experiences,” live shows, celebrity appearances, “exclusive on-stage moments,” meet and greets, live music and interviews with the athletes.
Sunday night is when the seven bouts kick off. At the close, Trump is scheduled to fly to France for the G7 summit.
Disassembly of the installations will begin the next day, and they are expected to be entirely removed by June 23.
The athletes’ Epsom salt baths
There are 14 athletes competing, and their training is rigorous.
Preparations start months in advance, working toward more intense weight cutting and diet alteration in the final week that can include fasting, extreme sauna use and hot Epsom salt baths.
They could be shaving as many as 20 pounds before weigh-ins, which are designed to keep the competition fair between similarly weighted combatants.
Lawsuit calls it ‘corrupt’
It was filed Saturday by the Public Integrity Project on behalf of the two Virginia residents and argues that Trump’s authorization of the event violated National Park Service regulations prohibiting sporting events on federal parklands.
One of the attorneys, Brendan Ballou, characterized it as a “corrupt use of our most sacred national monuments for private gain.”
The National Park Service pushed back on that claim, but also detailed the event’s preparations to make a point.
“All these hopes could be dashed at the very last moment,” it read, “by the whim of two people who believe they have superior taste and want to spoil the event for everyone else.”
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