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‘Corrupt Abuse of Power’: Dems Rip FCC Chair Over Kimmel Suspension
House Democrats issued an explosive statement attacking Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr, accusing him of a “corrupt abuse of power,” and calling for his resignation. Carr is being perceived by some as having pressured ABC to indefinitely suspend late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over his comments about Charlie Kirk and President Donald Trump.
“Mr. Carr, in an interview on a right-wing podcast on Wednesday, said that Mr. Kimmel’s remarks were part of a ‘concerted effort to lie to the American people,’ and that the F.C.C. was ‘going to have remedies that we can look at,'” The New York Times reported.
“Frankly, when you see stuff like this — I mean, we can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Carr told podcaster Benny Johnson. “These companies can find ways to change conduct and take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the F.C.C. ahead.”
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House Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and his leadership team blasted the controversial FCC Chair.
Carr has “engaged in the corrupt abuse of power,” Leader Jeffries alleged in a statement. “He has disgraced the office he holds by bullying ABC, the employer of Jimmy Kimmel, and forcing the company to bend the knee to the Trump administration. FCC Chair Brendan Carr should resign immediately.”
“Donald Trump and the Republican Party’s war on the First Amendment is blatantly inconsistent with American values,” Jeffries added. “The censoring of artists and cancellation of shows is an act of cowardice. It may also be part of a corrupt pay-to-play scheme.”
On Thursday, Carr said he fully supports the right of Sinclair Broadcast Group to ask Kimmel to make a personal donation to Kirk’s family and his foundation.
“I think Sinclair has every right to call for that,” Carr told CNBC on Thursday morning.
“If Sinclair affiliates with Disney, they take Disney contract, they have a contractual relationship with Disney, and that’s between the two of them to figure out, you know, what’s going to make sense to make both of them comfortable with the relationship going forward,” Carr said.
The Walt Disney Company is the parent company of ABC.
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“But again,” he continued, “over the years, it would be unthinkable for Sinclair, for Nexstar, for local TV stations to actually say, ‘You know what? You know, we’re not gonna take this particular programming that’s coming out of New York and Hollywood and send it to Pennsylvania and Utah.'”
Carr called “the idea that local broadcasters feel like they can push back,” a “much healthier dynamic for the country right now.”
According to The Independent, “Sinclair Broadcasting Group and Nexstar Communications Group, who operate large numbers of ABC affiliates between them, announced they would pull the show from Wednesday, branding the comments ‘offensive’ and ‘inappropriate’. This led ABC to ‘indefinitely’ suspend production of Jimmy Kimmel Live! in a move that has attracted widespread backlash.”
As The Guardian reported, “Kimmel said ‘many in Maga land are working very hard to capitalize on the murder of Charlie Kirk’ and mocked Vice-President JD Vance’s guest hosting of Kirk’s podcast, saying Trump was ‘fanning the flames’ by attacking people on the left.”
“Within a day, Carr condemned Kimmel’s comments as ‘truly sick‘ and suggested ABC and its parent company, Disney, could face regulatory consequences for spreading misinformation. The FCC chair also argued the network had violated obligations to operate in the ‘public interest’ under federal broadcasting rules.”
FCC Chair Brendan Carr says Sinclair has “every right” to demand that Jimmy Kimmel to donate to Turning Point USA pic.twitter.com/SCmDC8ljkL
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 18, 2025
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Image via Reuters
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
