Donald Trump is asserting his influence to determine the outcome of the Texas U.S. Senate race.
The president has endorsed Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton, even telling 2026 Republican National Midterm Convention attendees earlier this month that he would travel to the Lone Star State multiple times to bolster votes for his Senate pick.
Trump jeeringly refers to Kent’s opponent, James Talarico, as “Talafreako.”
However, the 80-year-old’s keynote remarks may not be the big fix Paxton needs to slow down the Democratic candidate’s steady momentum.
Recent polls project that the former middle school teacher leads Paxton by a 5-point margin.
What can hinder Talarico, though, is not being given an equal opportunity to access voters via the media, and some people suspect a scheme of that sort is at play.
Talarico appeared on the Sept. 10 taping of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” but the episode never aired on television.
Host Jimmy Kimmel told viewers, “We are being targeted by the FCC for the crime of interviewing political candidates, even though for years we, and every other late-night talk show, have welcomed numerous candidates, including Donald Trump.”
The Emmy winner further stated, “When he was running, he was on this show two times, but now I guess he doesn’t like me anymore or the First Amendment, so the FCC has threatened me — or threatened my show, my network, even our local ABC stations — because they want to make our editorial decision for us, which of course we cannot accept. So tonight we’re bypassing the public airwaves and hosting this interview on YouTube even though our government would clearly prefer that we not do it at all.”
The video is pinned at the top of the show’s YouTube page, where it has more than 10.390 million views. According to liberal audiences, Trump’s censorship henchman, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, is to blame for the broadcast disruption.
In a roundabout way, Carr denied claims that the agency was not abiding by the Equal Time statute, stating political candidates should be given equal airtime.
Carr tweeted, in part, the following about Talarico: “He’s just running the same hoax he did a few months ago on Colbert for the purpose of getting clicks and donations — he’s banking on people not understanding the statute or operating as partisan lemmings.”
The post included a meme of Kimmel riding a bike with Talarico strapped onto his back in a baby carrier.
The mocking, however, amplified social outrage.
“Can we at very least say that Trump has manipulated THE PEOPLE’S FCC to quash First Amendment rights on the national stage?” one person asked.
A second comment read, “When a government regulator can make broadcasters think twice about which political candidates they interview, the bigger issue isn’t Jimmy Kimmel. It’s the chilling effect on political speech.”
A third individual tied the ordeal back to the president.
They wrote, “Under Trump’s FCC Fox ‘News’ can program 24-7 Pro Trump propaganda, but ABC cannot air an interview with a Dem candidate for Senate in Texas.”
Talarico told MSN Now that the overreach of censorship is “the most dangerous form of cancel culture.”
Someone else recalled Trump’s ire for late-night host Stephen Colbert, whose show ended in May.
They said, “First Colbert, now Kimmel? They are REALLY scared of this guy.”
The president publicly suggested that Colbert and Kimmel be fired for criticizing his administration and making jokes about his endless political blunders.
Last year, ABC suspended Kimmel for a week over remarks about the president’s reaction to a question about Charlie Kirk. Trump hoped it would end the host’s career, but that clearly was not the case.
Jimmy Kimmel welcomes James Talarico on his show after Trump's FCC censored the interview on television:
— Headquarters (@HQNewsNow) September 11, 2026
"We are bypassing the public airwaves and hosting this interview on YouTube, even though our government would clearly prefer that we not do it at all." pic.twitter.com/CzPVJ1NSB2
