President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump sharply escalated their long-running feud with late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel on Monday, publicly demanding that the ABC host be immediately fired by Disney and the network over a joke he made days before a shooting incident at the White House Correspondents' Dinner.
The controversy centers on a comedic monologue Kimmel delivered on his April 23 episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, in which he staged an "alternative" version of the annual dinner roast.
"Look at Melania, so beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow." Kimmel also performed a Jeffrey Epstein-style impression introducing "Donald" and "Melania" and referenced a deleted Trump meme depicting the president as Jesus.
As the Epoch Times notes further, the Trumps took serious offense.
“Kimmel’s hateful and violent rhetoric is intended to divide our country. His monologue about my family isn’t comedy—his words are corrosive and deepens the political sickness within America,” Melania wrote on Monday in a post on X.
“People like Kimmel shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate.”
Video footage of the incident at the Washington Hilton ballroom, where the dinner was being held, showed Melania Trump sitting next to the president and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. The first lady looked visibly shocked at one point and began to move off stage before she and Trump were whisked to safety by Secret Service agents.
A White House official confirmed to The Epoch Times that Cole Allen was arrested in connection with the shooting. The official said Allen allegedly wrote a manifesto and sent it to members of his family, and that he traveled from California to Washington before the shooting.
On Sunday, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Allen was likely targeting Trump and members of his administration before he was tackled by security officials outside the dinner.
While Trump praised the Secret Service during a “60 Minutes” interview on Sunday evening, a senior White House official told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement on Monday that chief of staff Susie Wiles will convene a meeting to review security protocols with administration officials.
It’s not the first time Kimmel has drawn criticism from the Trump administration. In September 2025, his show was taken off the air for several days after comments he made about conservative activist Charlie Kirk following his assassination. At the time, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr said Kimmel may have made misleading comments.
When he returned to his show, Kimmel said, “It was never my intention to make light of a murder of a young man. I don’t think there’s anything funny about it.”
Responding to the controversy, Trump criticized ABC for allowing Kimmel back on the air in a Truth Social post, calling the host “in jeopardy” and saying the network is “not funny.”
Trump told Fox News on Sunday morning that his wife was unharmed and is “doing great” after the shooting incident. A lone Secret Service agent was shot in the chest but was protected by a bulletproof vest, Trump has said.
ABC, which is owned by Disney, did not immediately respond to an Epoch Times request for comment. Kimmel and ABC have not issued any public comments in response to Melania Trump’s post.