The executive branch clearly overstepped, and its attempt to suppress free speech backfired wildly.
This was 1989. An FBI assistant director sent a letter accusing a certain Compton rap group of encouraging “violence against and disrespect” against law enforcement. The group was, of course, NWA and the song was its police brutality protest anthem “Fuck tha Police.” The letter generated enormous press coverage, which decried government censorship and helped propel the song to widespread popularity and helped establish its legendary status.
There is, in other words, a long history of government officials and politicians trying to silence things in pop culture they don’t like, only for their efforts to have the exact opposite of their intended effect (the so-called Streisand Effect — though that famous example was a celebrity vs. paparazzi rather than the government).
So its perhaps no surprise that President Trump’s efforts to silence Comedy Central’s South Park, CBS’ The Late Show With Stephen Colbert and ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! have resulted in all three shows surging in the ratings and, in a couple cases, to their biggest numbers in decades.
Tuesday’s return of Jimmy Kimmel Live! — after ABC suspended the show in the wake of FCC Chairman Brendan Carr bullying affiliates to boycott the series — generated 6.26 million viewers for the network. That’s the show’s biggest audience ever for a regularly scheduled episode. The blockbuster numbers were despite 66 affiliates, covering about a quarter of the country, not airing the show. The monologue itself became Kimmel’s most watched on YouTube, generating 26 million views across social media in less than 24 hours.
Trump has since threatened to sue ABC over Kimmel’s return, raging on social, “I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back. … Last time I went after them, they gave me $16 Million Dollars. This one sounds even more lucrative. A true bunch of losers! Let Jimmy Kimmel rot in his bad Ratings.”
Colbert’s talk show is still going to end next year — which one might count as Trump gaining a scalp given that the July cancellation announcement was made amid parent company Paramount Global waiting for the FCC’s approval for its Skydance merger. CBS insists they were going to end the show anyway for economic reasons but that they simply made the announcement at the most suspicious possible time. Given Carr’s bold public comments since then going after Kimmel — which have been described as illegal — one can only imagine what might have been privately back-channeled. In its first airing after the cancellation announcement, The Late Show surged 35 percent higher in total viewers and stayed higher than usual in the dog days of August (though with only a handful of new episodes).
And then there is South Park. While Trump hasn’t called for the show to be canceled per se, the president and members of his administration have repeatedly bashed the show since its 27th season premiere in July, generating national headlines and helping drive curiosity tune-in. The result has been some of the veteran animated comedy’s highest ratings in 26 years, with the first two episodes of the season averaging better than 6 million cross-platform viewers.
(All of these are entertainment shows, and there’s a different and more complicated conversation to be had on the news side. Trump went after CBS News’ 60 Minutes, for instance, with Paramount Global vowing editorial changes after settling his lawsuit.)
So overall, what doesn’t kill these entertainment shows has only made them stronger — even if only temporarily, as late-night spikes tend to quickly fade.
This does, however, assume that hurting these shows is Trump’s real goal. The man is nothing if not media savvy, and there’s perhaps nobody on the planet who has benefited more from being attacked than he has. He understands the impact his attention can have. So perhaps his attacks aren’t really about these shows but to distract for more serious matters – such as his inability to halt Russia’s war machine in Ukraine, his tariff policies slowing economic growth and increasing inflation and, of course, his own right flank’s obsession with the Epstein files. The ratings victories of a trio of late night shows mocking the administration might have all of us looking exactly in the direction that Trump wants.
[SRC] https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/trump-kimmel-south-park-colbert-ratings-1236385589/
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