decision

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to uphold President Trump’s birthright citizenship order declaring that children born to parents who are in the United States illegally or temporarily are not American citizens.

The appeal, shared with the Associated Press on Saturday, sets in motion a process at the high court that could lead to a definitive ruling from the justices on whether the citizenship restrictions are constitutional.

Lower-court judges have blocked them from taking effect anywhere. The Republican administration is not asking the court to let the restrictions take effect before it rules.

The Justice Department’s petition has been shared with lawyers for parties challenging the order, but is not yet docketed at the Supreme Court.

Any decision on whether to take up the case probably is months away and arguments probably would not take place until the late winter or early spring.

“The lower court’s decisions invalidated a policy of prime importance to the president and his administration in a manner that undermines our border security,” Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer wrote. “Those decisions confer, without lawful justification, the privilege of American citizenship on hundreds of thousands of unqualified people.”

Cody Wofsy, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who represents children who would be affected by Trump’s restrictions, said the administration’s plan is plainly unconstitutional.

“This executive order is illegal, full stop, and no amount of maneuvering from the administration is going to change that. We will continue to ensure that no baby’s citizenship is ever stripped away by this cruel and senseless order,” Wofsy said in an email.

Trump signed an executive order on the first day of his second term in the White House that would upend more than 125 years of understanding that the Constitution’s 14th Amendment confers citizenship on everyone born on American soil, with narrow exceptions for the children of foreign diplomats and those born to a foreign occupying force.

In a series of decisions, lower courts have struck down the executive order as unconstitutional, or likely so, even after a Supreme Court ruling in late June that limited judges’ use of nationwide injunctions.

While the Supreme Court curbed the use of nationwide injunctions, it did not rule out other court orders that could have nationwide effects, including in class-action lawsuits and those brought by states. The justices did not decide at that time whether the underlying citizenship order is constitutional.

But every lower court that has looked at the issue has concluded that Trump’s order violates or probably violates the 14th Amendment, which was intended to ensure that Black people, including formerly enslaved people, had citizenship.

The administration is appealing two cases.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco ruled in July that a group of states that sued over the order needed a nationwide injunction to prevent the problems that would be caused by birthright citizenship being in effect in some states and not others.

Also in July, a federal judge in New Hampshire blocked the citizenship order in a class-action lawsuit including all children who would be affected.

Birthright citizenship automatically makes anyone born in the United States an American citizen, including children born to mothers who are in the country illegally, under long-standing rules. The right was enshrined soon after the Civil War in the first sentence of the 14th Amendment.

The administration has asserted that children of noncitizens are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States and therefore not entitled to citizenship.

Sherman and Whitehurst write for the Associated Press.

A group of Walt Disney Co. shareholders is demanding the company release information related to the suspension of late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, according to a recent letter.

The letter, dated Wednesday and sent by the American Federation of Teachers union and press freedom group Reporters Without Borders, said the groups want transparency into Disney’s decision last week to indefinitely suspend the show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” following comments he made in his monologue about the shooter who killed conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

Disney reinstated Kimmel’s show Tuesday, saying in a statement that the initial decision was made to “avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country” and calling some of his comments “ill-timed and thus insensitive.”

The late-night host’s suspension set off a political firestorm and nationwide debate about free speech. Protesters demonstrated outside the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood as well as Disney’s Burbank headquarters. More than 400 celebrities signed an open letter decrying attempts at government censorship. Some called for consumers to cancel their Disney+ streaming subscriptions.

“Disney shareholders deserve the truth about exactly what went down inside the company after Brendan Carr’s threat to punish ABC unless action was taken against Jimmy Kimmel,” American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten said in a statement. “The Disney board has a legal responsibility to act in the best interests of its shareholders — and we are seeking answers to discover if that bond was broken to kowtow to the Trump administration.”

Prior to the initial suspension decision, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr had called for Disney to take action against Kimmel during a podcast interview that aired last week. Carr said there could be consequences for the TV stations that carry his show. Shortly before Disney announced Kimmel’s initial suspension, TV station groups Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcast Group each said they would preempt the show and have said they will not bring it back.

The letter calls for Disney to provide records, including any meeting minutes or written materials, related to the suspension or return of Kimmel’s show.

“There is a credible basis to suspect that the Board and executives may have breached their fiduciary duties of loyalty, care, and good faith by placing improper political or affiliate considerations above the best interests of the Company and its stockholders,” the letter said.

Disney did not respond to a request for comment.

Times staff writer Meg James contributed to this report.

Jessica Chastain has publicly challenged Apple TV+ following the streamer’s decision to hold her upcoming series “The Savant.”

Apple TV+ on Tuesday said it would be delaying the release of the show about domestic terrorism, which follows an investigator who infiltrates online hate groups.

Chastain voiced her opposition to the postponement Wednesday on Instagram, writing that she and Apple were “not aligned on the decision to pause the release of The Savant.”

Representatives for Apple TV+ did not immediately respond to The Times’ request for comment.

In her Instagram post, Chastain said, “In the last five years since we’ve been making the show, we’ve seen an unfortunate amount of violence in the United States,” going on to cite the Jan. 6 insurrection and the Sept. 10 shooting death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk among instances of political violence in recent years.

“I’ve never shied away from difficult subjects, and while I wish this show wasn’t so relevant, unfortunately it is,” Chastain said.

“The Savant is about the heroes who work every day to stop violence before it happens, and honoring their courage feels more urgent than ever,” she said.

Chastain said she hopes audiences will be able to see the show soon. Apple has not yet announced a new release date for the series.

Jimmy Kimmel is back — and like his late-night peers, he’s not shying away from talking about ABC’s decision to bench him.

Tuesday’s show marked Kimmel’s return to his talk series since Walt Disney Co.-owned ABC announced last week that it was suspending the show indefinitely. The decision came after Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcasting, owners of ABC affiliates, said they would not air the show because of comments Kimmel made about the suspect in the shooting death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Both companies said they would continue to keep “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” off air.

Kimmel was greeted by the studio audience with a long standing ovation and chants of “Jimmy.” He cracked a joke to open: “Who had a weirder 48 hours — me or the CEO of Tylenol?”

The host said he was moved by the support he had received from friends and fans, but especially from those who disagree with him. He cited comments from Ted Cruz and mentioned the support he received from Ben Shapiro, Candace Owens and Mitch McConnell.

“Our government cannot be allowed to control what we do and do not say on television, and that we have to stand up to it,” he said. “I’ve been hearing a lot about what I need to say and do tonight, and the truth is, I don’t think what I have to say is going to make much of a difference. If you like me, you like me; if you don’t, you don’t; I have no illusions about changing anyone’s mind.”

What was most important to him, though, was imparting that it was “never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” Kimmel said through tears.

“I understand that to some that felt either ill timed or unclear or maybe both, and for those who think I did point a finger, I get why you’re upset,” Kimmel said of his comments about Kirk’s suspected killer. “If the situation was reversed, there’s a good chance I’d have felt the same way. I have many friends and family members on the other side who I love and remain close to, even though we don’t agree on politics at all. I don’t think the murderer who shot Charlie Kirk represents anyone. This was a sick person who believed violence was a solution and it isn’t.”

Kimmel also said his ability to speak freely is “something I’m embarrassed to say I took for granted until they pulled my friend Stephen [Colbert] off the air and tried to coerce the affiliates who run our show in the cities that you live in to take my show off the air.”

“That’s not legal,” he continued. “That’s not American. That is un-American.”

The host did not comment on his suspension until Tuesday’s episode, which will air on the West Coast at 11:35 p.m. PT, but talk show hosts, actors, comedians, writers and even the former head of Disney had condemned ABC’s decision to pause production.

Hours before he taped Tuesday’s episode, Kimmel posted on Instagram for the first time since his suspension, sharing a photo of himself with iconic television creator Norman Lear. Kimmel captioned the photo “Missing this guy today.” The late Lear, whom Kimmel collaborated with on the television specials “Live in Front of a Studio Audience,” was an outspoken advocate for freedom of speech and the 1st Amendment and he founded the organization People for the American Way, which aims to stop censorship as one of its many goals.

Trump also took to social media before Tuesday’s episode to express his thoughts about Kimmel’s return, writing on Truth Social that he couldn’t believe the show was coming back: “The White House was told by ABC that his Show was cancelled [sic]!”

“Why would they want someone back who does so poorly, who’s not funny, and who puts the Network in jeopardy by playing 99% positive Democrat GARBAGE,” Trump continued. “He is yet another arm of the DNC and, to the best of my knowledge, that would be a major Illegal Campaign Contribution.

He went on to write he wanted to “test ABC out on this.”

“Let’s see how we do. Last time I went after them, they gave me $16 Million Dollars,” he wrote, referencing the settlement with ABC after Trump filed a defamation lawsuit over inaccurate statements made about him by ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos. “This one sounds even more lucrative. A true bunch of losers! Let Jimmy Kimmel rot in his bad Ratings.”

Pressure to suspend Kimmel came from Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr, who said in a podcast interview last week that ABC had to act on Kimmel’s comments. The Trump appointee said, “We can do it the easy way or the hard way.”

Hours later, Nexstar, which controls 32 ABC affiliates, agreed to drop “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” indefinitely, and ABC followed with its own announcement that it was pulling Kimmel from the network. Sinclair Broadcasting, a TV station company long sympathetic to conservative causes, also shelved the show and went a step further by demanding that Kimmel make a financial contribution to Kirk’s family and his conservative advocacy organization Turning Point USA.

FCC Commissioner Anna M. Gomez, one of three commissioners, and the only Democratic member, released a searing statement the next day.

Gomez said the FCC “does not have the authority, the ability, or the constitutional right to police content or punish broadcasters for speech the government dislikes” and called the network’s move a “shameful show of cowardly corporate capitulation by ABC that has put the foundation of the First Amendment in danger.”

“When corporations surrender in the face of that pressure, they endanger not just themselves, but the right to free expression for everyone in this country,” Gomez continued. “The duty to defend the First Amendment does not rest with government, but with all of us. Free speech is the foundation of our democracy, and we must push back against any attempt to erode it.”

Times staff writers Stephen Battaglio and Meg James contributed to this report.

Kamala Harris picked her way through several sticky subjects in a Tuesday night TV interview, including her account of being ghosted by Gov. Gavin Newsom when she called for his support during her brief, unsuccessful 2024 presidential campaign.

On the eve of the public release of her book detailing that campaign, Harris spoke with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow on her relationship with Newsom as well as the redistricting ballot measure Californians will vote on in November — and she also hailed “the power of the people” in getting Jimmy Kimmel back on ABC.

Kimmel was indefinitely suspended last week by the Walt Disney Co. over remarks he made about the suspect in the shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. After fierce protests, consumers announcing subscription cancellations, and hundreds of celebrities speaking out against government censorship, Disney announced Monday that Kimmel would return on ABC the following day.

“Talk about the power being with the people and the people making that clear with their checkbooks,” Harris said of Kimmel’s return. “It spoke volumes, and it moved a decision in the right direction.”

Harris was speaking with Maddow about her new book, “107 Days,” which details her short sprint of a presidential campaign in 2024 after then-President Biden decided not to seek reelection.

The book discloses which Democrats immediately supported her to become the Democratic nominee, and which didn’t, notably Newsom. She wrote that, when she called, he texted her that he was hiking and would call her back but never did.

After Maddow raised the anecdote in the opening of the show, Harris said she had known Newsom “forever.”

“Gavin has a great sense of humor so, you know, he’s gonna be fine,” Harris said.

Newsom was icier when asked by a reporter about the interaction — or lack thereof — on Friday.

“You want to waste your time with this, we’ll do it,” Newsom said, adding that he was hiking when he received a call from an unknown number, even as he was trying to learn more about Biden’s decision not to run for reelection while also asking his team to craft a statement supporting Harris to be the Democratic nominee. “I assume that’s in the book as well — that, hours later, the endorsement came out.”

Harris brought up Newsom when asked about Proposition 50, the redistricting ballot measure championed by the governor and other California Democrats that voters will decide in November. If approved, the state’s congressional districts will be redrawn in an effort to boost Democratic seats in the house to counter efforts by President Trump to increase the number of Republicans elected in GOP-led states.

“Let me say about what [Newsom] is doing, redistricting, it is absolutely the right way to go. Part of what we’ve got to, I think, challenge ourselves to accept, is that we tend to play by the rules,” Harris said. “But I think this is a moment where you gotta fight fire with fire. And so what Gavin is doing, what the California Legislature is doing, what those who are supporting it are doing is to say, ‘You know what, you want to play, then let’s get in the field. Let’s get in the arena, and let’s do this.’ And I support that.”

But Harris was more cautious when asked about other electoral contests, notably the New York City mayoral race. Zohran Mamdani is the Democratic nominee and has large leads in the polls over other candidates in the race, including former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and incumbent Mayor Eric Adams.

Asked whether she backed Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, Harris was measured.

“Look, as far as I’m concerned, he’s the Democratic nominee, and he should be supported,” Harris said, prompting Maddow to ask whether she endorsed him.

“I support the Democrat in the race, sure,” she replied. “But let me just say this, he’s not the only star. … I hope that we don’t so over-index on New York City that we lose sight of the stars throughout our country.”

Harris, who announced this summer that she would not run for California governor next year, demurred when asked about whether she would run for president for a third time in 2028.

“That’s not my focus right now,” she said.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said Monday it will decide on reversing a 90-year precedent that has protected independent agencies from direct control by the president.

The court’s conservative majority has already upheld President Trump’s firing of Democratic appointees at the National Labor Relations Board and Merit Systems Protection Board. And in a separate order on Monday, it upheld Trump’s removal of a Democratic appointee at the Federal Trade Commission.

Those orders signal the court is likely to rule for the president and that he has the full authority to fire officials at independent agencies, if Congress said they had fixed terms.

The only hint of doubt has focused on the Federal Reserve Board. In May, when the court upheld the firing of an NLRB official, it said it decision does not threaten the independence of Federal Reserve.

The court described it as “a uniquely structured, quasi-private entity that follows in the distinct historical tradition of the First and Second Banks of the United States.” Trump did not share that view. He threatened to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell during the summer because he had not lowered interest rates.

And he is now seeking to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, a Biden appointee, based on the allegation she may have committed mortgage fraud when she took out two home loans in 2021.

Trump’s lawyers sent an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court last week seeking to have Cook removed now.

Long before Trump’s presidency, Chief Justice John G. Roberts had argued that the president has the constitutional power to control federal agencies and to hire or fire all officials who exercise significant executive authority.

But that view stands in conflict with what the court has said for more than a century. Since 1887, when Congress created the Interstate Commerce Commission to regulate railroad rates, lawmakers on Capitol Hill believed they had the authority to create independent boards and commissions.

Typically, the president would be authorized appoint officials who would serve a fixed term set by law. At times, Congress also required the boards have a mix of both Republican and Democratic appointees.

The Supreme Court unanimously upheld that understanding in a 1935 case called Humphrey’s Executor. The justices said then these officials made judicial-type decisions, and they should be shielded from direct control by the president.

That decision was a defeat for President Franklin Roosevelt who tried to fire a Republican appointee on the Federal Trade Commission.

In recent years, the chief justice and his conservative colleagues have questioned the idea that Congress can shield officials from direct control by the president.

In Monday’s order, the court said it will hear arguments in December on “whether the statutory removal protections for members of the Federal Trade Commission violate the separation of powers and, if so, whether Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, 295 U. S. 602 (1935), should be overruled.”

Justice Elena Kagan has repeatedly dissented in these cases and argued that Congress has the power to make the law and structure the government, not the president.

Joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, she objected on Monday that the court has continued to fire independent officials at Trump’s request.

“Our emergency docket should never be used, as it has been this year, to permit what our own precedent bars,” she wrote. “Still more, it should not be used, as it also has been, to transfer government authority from Congress to the President, and thus to reshape the Nation’s separation of powers.”

A WOMAN who “never” wears a bra has hit back at those criticising her for the choice.

Lauren has never made a secret of her dislike of the underwear, but her openness has seen her hit with criticism online.

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However, in a video on her TikTok page, she responded to the backlash, and said she doesn’t understand why people care.

“I don’t know why so many of you have got such a problem with the fact that I don’t wear a bra,” she said.

“I don’t have enough chest, I don’t think, to warrant wearing a bra every single day.”

Lauren added that if she “absolutely has to”, she’ll put on a bra, but will always go for an unpadded, unwired ‘bralette’ type option.

But even wearing one of them makes her feel “anxious and antsy”, and makes her “skin itch”.

And considering Jennifer Aniston made it “trendy not to wear a bra” in the 90s, Lauren doesn’t get why she can’t get away with it in 2025.

“It doesn’t affect your day, whether I wear a bra or not… why do you care?” she continued.

“If somebody else walking down the street didn’t wear a bra, I’d be like, ‘oh, she’s not wearing a bra’ and continue with my day.

“I don’t care who wears a bra or who doesn’t. I don’t care what other women decide to do with their bodies.

“That is up to them. It is none of my business!

“If I don’t wear a bra because I don’t want to, that is none of your business. Okay?”

“I don’t care what other women decide to wear or not wear, if your comfortable and happy and living your best life then you do you boo,” Lauren captioned her video.

People were quick to comment on the video, with one admitting: “If I could get away without wearing one, I would.

“In the house I never do, or as soon as I’m home it’s off, but when I’m out I have to.

“They’re so uncomfortable and make me feel restricted. But no-one wants to see this swinging about in public.”

“The fact people care or have an opinion on other people wearing a bar is WILD to me,” another added.

Top bra tips

Fabulous’ Deputy Fashion Editor, Abby McHale has shared her tips for keeping your bras looking their best.

1. Don’t wash your bras in the washing machine on their own, this is how your wiring will get damaged. Instead either wash in a pillowcase or take them in the shower with you and wash as you would your body. 

2. Always start on the loosest hooks for your back, that way as the bra is worn more and the elastic stretches you can tighten it up with the tighter hooks. 

3. If you wear your bra two to three times a week then it should last between six months to a year before you need to replace it. 

4. You should always be able to feel your bra throughout the day, if you don’t it means it’s not doing its job properly. 

5. It’s actually the band across the back that keeps your boobs upright and not the cups itself.

“You do you babe!”

“It’s no business of anyone else, you do what is comfortable for you, and sod the haters!” a third insisted.

“You look absolutely fabulous without one and I think you should wear whatever you like,” someone else agreed.

“Just be free and enjoy,” another urged.

NEW YORK — The decision about whether to keep Jimmy Kimmel on his late-night ABC show depends on far more than his jokes. The choice is complicated by a web of business and regulatory considerations involving ABC’s parent company, other media companies and the Trump administration.

It’s the inevitable result of industry consolidation that over years has built giant corporations with wide-ranging interests.

ABC owner Walt Disney Co., a massive organization with far-flung operations, frequently seeks federal regulatory approval to expand, buy or sell businesses or acquire licenses. And the Trump administration has not spared the company from investigations, opening multiple inquiries in just the last few months to investigate alleged antitrust, programming and hiring violations.

Kimmel was suspended from his show last week following comments suggesting that fans of Charlie Kirk were trying to “score political points” over the conservative activist’s shooting death. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr called the remarks “truly sick” and suggested his agency would look into them.

Carr answers to President Trump, a frequent Kimmel target whose dislike of the comedian is well known.

Two companies that operate roughly a quarter of ABC affiliates nationwide, Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcasting, also said they would not air Kimmel’s show.

Disney took a step in December to avoid a confrontation with Trump by paying $15 million to settle Trump’s defamation lawsuit against ABC News and anchor George Stephanopoulos, in a case many civil rights attorneys considered weak. It also made moves to dismantle some of its diversity, equity and inclusion practices, including removing references in its annual report to its Reimagine Tomorrow program aimed at “amplifying underrepresented voices.”

Apparently that wasn’t enough.

In April, the FCC sent a a blistering letter to Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger saying it suspected the company was so thoroughly “infected” with “invidious” practices favoring minorities that it had no choice but to open an investigation.

Among other questions, the inquiry sought to determine whether Disney had really ended policies designed to ensure characters in its shows and its hiring practices favored “underrepresented groups.”

Meanwhile, a Disney deal struck in January to buy a stake in the streaming service FuboTV fell under scrutiny too, with several reports that the Justice Department was investigating possible antitrust violations.

The Federal Trade Commission also launched an inquiry into whether Disney broke rules by gathering personal data from children watching its videos without permission from parents. Disney settled the case this month by paying $10 million and agreeing to change its practices.

Disney also needs approval from the Trump administration for ESPN to complete its acquisition of the NFL Network.

It hasn’t helped that Disney was a target for many conservatives well before the current controversy. Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis battled with the company over its criticism of a DeSantis-backed law that restricted discussion of sexual orientation in schools.

Kirk wasn’t a fan, either, criticizing Disney when it closed Splash Mountain rides at theme parks three years ago to remove references to the 1946 film “Song of the South,” which has long been decried as racist for its romanticized depictions of slavery.

The move, Kirk’s website posted, was “destructive to our cultural and societal fabric.”

The companies with ABC stations that put out statements disavowing Kimmel have their own business before the government. Nexstar needs the Trump administration’s approval to complete its $6.2-billion purchase of broadcast rival Tegna.

Sinclair has its own regulatory challenges. In June, it entered into an agreement with the FCC to fix problems with paperwork filed to the agency and to observe rules about advertising on children’s shows and closed-captioning requirements. It has also petitioned the regulator to relax rules limiting broadcaster ownership of stations.

The companies are being asked by advocates and others to put aside financial concerns to stand up for free speech.

“Where has all the leadership gone?” ex-Disney Chief Executive Michael Eisner wrote Friday on social media. “If not for university presidents, law firm managing partners and corporate chief executives standing up to bullies, then who will step up for the First Amendment?”

The administration’s attacks on Kimmel have also been criticized in some unexpected places, such as the Wall Street Journal and Bari Weiss’ website, the Free Press — both known for their conservative editorial voices — and by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, a staunch conservative and Trump ally.

The comedian’s comments don’t justify the right wing’s move toward regulatory censorship, the Journal wrote in an editorial. “As victims of cancel culture for so long, conservatives more than anyone should oppose it,” the Journal wrote. “They will surely be the targets again when the left returns to power.”

“When a network drops a high-profile talent hours after the FCC chairman makes a barely veiled threat, then it’s no longer just a business decision,” the Free Press wrote in an editorial. “It’s government coercion. Is it now Trump administration policy to punish broadcasters for comedy that doesn’t conform to its politics?”

Bauder and Condon write for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is ending the federal government’s annual report on hunger in America, stating that it had become “overly politicized” and “rife with inaccuracies.”

The decision comes 2½ months after President Trump signed legislation sharply reducing food aid to the poor. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the tax and spending cuts bill Republicans adopted in July means 3 million people would not qualify for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, also known as food stamps.

The decision to scrap the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Household Food Security Report was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

In a news release Saturday, the USDA said the 2024 report, to be released Oct. 22, would be the last.

“The questions used to collect the data are entirely subjective and do not present an accurate picture of actual food security,” the USDA said. ”The data is rife with inaccuracies slanted to create a narrative that is not representative of what is actually happening in the countryside as we are currently experiencing lower poverty rates, increasing wages, and job growth under the Trump Administration.’’

The Census Bureau reported earlier this month that the U.S. poverty rate dipped from 11% in 2023 to 10.6% last year, before Trump took office.

Critics accused the administration of deliberately making it harder to measure hunger and assess the impact of its cuts to food stamps.

“Trump is cancelling an annual government survey that measures hunger in America, rather than allow it to show hunger increasing under his tenure,” Bobby Kogan, senior director of federal budget policy at the left-leaning Center for American Progress, said on social media. “This follows the playbook of many non-democracies that cancel or manipulate reports that would otherwise show less-than-perfect news.”

Wiseman writes for the Associated Press.

More than 100 members of the Writers Guild of America East and their supporters jammed the sidewalk in front of Walt Disney Co.’s Lower Manhattan headquarters Friday to protest ABC’s decision to pull “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

The late-night program has been dark since Wednesday, when the Disney-owned network announced in a terse statement that it will be “preempted indefinitely.” The move followed decisions by two major owners of ABC affiliates to drop the show because of Kimmel’s remarks about the suspect in the shooting death of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.

Members of the union, which represents TV and film writers, marched with signs calling the move an attack on free speech and accusing Walt Disney Co. executives of lacking backbone.

Among the messages: “Disney and ABC Capitulation and Censorship,” “Always Be Cowards,” “Absolute Bull— Cowards” and “Disney/ABC Bows to Trump Extortion.” There were chants of “Bring Jimmy back.”

The demonstration reflected anger building in the creative community over Kimmel’s removal, which Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr called for during a podcast interview that aired on Wednesday.

Carr said if action was not taken against Kimmel, there could be consequences for the TV stations that carry his show.

On Monday’s show, Kimmel seemed to suggest during his monologue that Tyler Robinson, the Utah man accused in the shooting death of Kirk, might have been a pro-Trump Republican. He said MAGA supporters “are 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.”

The remarks prompted a widespread conservative backlash on social media, including demands for Kimmel’s firing. Kimmel, who has expressed sympathy for Kirk’s family online, has not yet commented on his removal.

President Trump has also said that late-night hosts who are critical of his administration should be banished from the airwaves. Trump cheered ABC’s decision, as he did the recent cancellation of CBS’ “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.”

Kimmel remains off the air and has had discussions with Disney executives about how to bring the show back on the air. But his future with the network remains uncertain.

Greg Iwinski, a late-night TV writer and council member of the WGA East, said the threat of pulling a broadcast license is a dangerous weapon that can be used on any program and ultimately chill free expression.

“You can use that for any broadcast network anywhere,” Iwinski said. “Any late-night show, daytime show, game show or sitcom — any show you don’t like. Everything is under threat that is on network TV.”

Iwinski warned that ABC’s actions will only invite the Trump administration to exert more control over the broadcast airwaves.

“What if a relationship on a drama doesn’t fit the values of Donald Trump?” he said. “What if it’s not racially representative of what he thinks — ‘Well, we’re going to pull your licenses’ — all of that is on the table.”

The WGA East members were joined by local government officials supporting their cause, including New York City Comptroller Brad Lander.

Statements of protest over ABC’s moves are coming from all corners of the entertainment industry, including from Michael Eisner, the former Disney chief who preceded Bob Iger’s first run in the job.

“Where has all the leadership gone?” Eisner wrote Friday on X. “If not for university presidents, law firm managing partners, and corporate chief executives standing up against bullies, who then will step up for the first amendment?”

Eisner said ABC’s action is “yet another example of out of control intimidation” by the FCC.

“Maybe the Constitution should have said, ‘Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, except in one’s political or financial self-interest.’” Eisner added. “By-the-way, for the record, this ex-CEO finds Jimmy Kimmel very talented and funny.”

Disney did not immediately comment on Eisner’s post.

Damon Lindelof, the Emmy-winning co-creator of the hit ABC series “Lost,” said in an Instagram post Wednesday that he would no longer work for Disney or ABC unless Kimmel is reinstated.

A major Republican voice weighed in on Friday as well, with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) saying the FCC chair’s threats are “dangerous as hell” and compared them to organized crime tactics.

Carr, who has been in lockstep with Trump on matters concerning the media, has said that stations have the right to pull the show if owners believe the content conflicts with community standards.

“Broadcast TV stations have always been required by their licenses to operate in the public interest — that includes serving the needs of their local communities,” he wrote Thursday on X. “And broadcasters have long retained the right to not air national programs that they believe are inconsistent with the public interest, including their local communities’ values. I am glad to see that many broadcasters are responding to their viewers as intended.”

Filming was about to start on David E. Kelley’s Apple TV+ series “Margo’s Got Money Troubles” in early January when the wildfires hit the Los Angeles area, devastating Pacific Palisades and Altadena.

Crew members lost their homes or were dealing with severe smoke damage. Others on the show took people who were displaced into their houses.

To add to the uncertainty, the series was still waiting to hear whether it would receive a state film and television tax credit.

It was time for a decision, Kelley and his fellow producers thought. Should they play it safe and relocate to a cheaper filming locale, such as New Mexico or Vancouver, to ensure they had the budget to film the pivotal mid-season finale in Las Vegas?

They took a gamble and decided to stay in California. The bet paid off. “Margo” got a tax credit of about $1.2 million per episode, and the show was able to shoot both in the Los Angeles area and travel to Las Vegas for four days of filming.

“The rest of the story is a California story,” said Matthew Tinker, president of David E. Kelley Productions. “It’s really magical to leave L.A., go to Vegas and then come back, and it gives the show a huge production value that otherwise, we wouldn’t have had.”

Matthew Tinker, president of David E. Kelley Productions, stands on the rooftop of producer David E. Kelley’s new production office in Santa Monica.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

As film and TV projects have increasingly moved out of state in search of better tax incentives and cheaper costs — moves that have culled the number of Hollywood jobs — Kelley’s production company is doubling down on California. The former attorney turned writer-producer is one of the biggest names in TV behind such legal dramas as “Ally McBeal” and “The Practice.”

All of his current projects will shoot in L.A., including the third season of HBO series “Big Little Lies,” the legal drama “The Lincoln Lawyer,” a new HBO Max series based on a Michael Connelly book called “Nightshade” that takes place on Santa Catalina Island, and the thriller “Presumed Innocent.”

Post-production work for his shows also is done in L.A. Kelley’s company, known as David E. Kelley Productions, also recently moved into a new headquarters in Santa Monica, where it plans to make a home for the foreseeable future.

“It just feels wrong to me that L.A. is not continuing to be the epicenter for film and television series,” Kelley said via Zoom in August. “This town has been very good to me for many, many years, so I have an inclination not to abandon it, to cling to the community that has been so rewarding for me.”

The sentiment is shared by his second-in-command.

From the concrete rooftop garden atop the Santa Monica building that houses Kelley’s production office, Tinker looked out at the hills, remembering the wall of smoke that lingered for days.

The January wildfires also encouraged the decision to keep Kelley’s production company in L.A., despite some pitches to move out of state. At the time, there had been industry chatter that the state’s incentive program would be bolstered, giving some optimism for the future of production in the state. But after the fires, there was no question. The company saw the need to rebuild and reinvest in L.A. and Hollywood. The eventual boost to the state’s film and TV tax credit program approved this summer solidified their decision.

“The fires challenged our resilience and sense of community, but the people of L.A. rallied,” Tinker said. “There simply wasn’t a thought beyond this moment to plant roots anywhere else.”

The 2,900-square-foot office, which is a new build that replaced an older building in Santa Monica, is sleek and modern, with concrete walls and flooring, dark wood details, two arcade game machines and a shelving unit holding dozens of awards right at the heart of the space. Inside Tinker’s office is an homage to Hollywood history.

A wall showcases trophies at producer David E. Kelley’s new production office in Santa Monica.

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

An old sign from Kelley’s previous offices at the Fox lot hangs on the wall, next to the title page for the first episode of “Margo,” addressed to David and signed by actor Elle Fanning. A photo of Ronald Reagan with Matthew Tinker’s late grandfather Grant Tinker, former chief executive of NBC, sits near a bobblehead from Kelley’s “Boston Legal” days and a black-and-white group shot of Matthew’s father, John Tinker, winning a writing Emmy for the drama “St. Elsewhere” in 1986.

When looking back at his own career, Matthew Tinker has done “pretty much every job under the sun,” which was only possible in a city that consistently had multiple productions running.

That concern for the future of industry employment was a major part of Hollywood and state legislators’ push to increase the annual funding for California’s film and TV tax credit program to $750 million and expand eligibility criteria to allow more projects to apply.

Memorabilia in the office of Matthew Tinker, president of David E. Kelley Productions.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

Those changes, which were approved by Gov. Gavin Newsom this summer, have now largely gone into effect and are starting to produce results.

In the first round of TV show tax credits since the program was revamped, the California Film Commission saw a nearly 400% increase in applications and awarded tax credits to a total of 22 shows.

“There was a lot of pent-up demand,” said Colleen Bell, executive director of the California Film Commission. “There’s a lot of momentum here, and these improvements to the program have helped to drive that momentum.”

The new activity is much needed. Production activity in L.A. so far this year is down 9% compared with last year, according to the nonprofit FilmLA, which tracks shoot days in Greater L.A. 2024 was the second-worst year on record for production in the area after 2020, when the industry shut down due to the pandemic.

But there is hope on the horizon — of the 22 new TV projects that received a California tax credit this past round, 18 are slated to film largely in Greater L.A., including Kelley’s “Presumed Innocent.”

“The more that people have hope in the future of California as a production destination, I think you will continue to see entrepreneurs and others make their careers here,” said Philip Sokoloski, spokesman for FilmLA.

Because Los Angeles is more costly than other locations, filmmakers must make certain adjustments, such as shooting a TV series in 85 days instead of 100, or reducing daily filming hours.

But that’s very doable with experienced crews in L.A., said Caroline James, co-executive producer of “Presumed Innocent” and “Margo,” which employed about 500 people.

“There’s such an infrastructure in L.A.,” she said. “There’s no learning curve.”

Kelley’s production company, which has six employees including the veteran writer and producer, may not always be able to shoot everything in L.A., but executives intend to keep L.A. first and foremost in their decision-making and hopes that mentality will catch on around town.

“The goal is to always look at California first,” Tinker said.

The recent suspension of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” is an attack on democracy. Though not necessarily the democracy one might think.

Free speech is protected by the 1st Amendment. This grants the late-night host the freedom to say whatever he thinks without fear of arrest or state-sanctioned violence. It does not necessarily guarantee that he will not be censured, or fired, if his remarks violate his employer’s rules or standards.

President Trump discovered this in 2015 when, citing inflammatory remarks the then-presidential candidate made about undocumented Mexican immigrants, NBC — the network that aired “The Apprentice” and Trump’s Miss Universe pageant — cut ties with him.

This is the most obvious explanation for Trump declaring war on television, despite it being the industry that, via “The Apprentice” and a deluge of coverage during his first presidential campaign, helped propel him to the presidency. Paybacks are a b— and this particular president thrives on them.

And it is definitely war. Trump has a long history of attacking various TV networks and personalities, including Kimmel. The regularity, name-checking and vitriol of these attacks far outstrip the anger many presidents have expressed toward the media, but they are in keeping with Trump’s general brand of “whataboutism” and victimization.

A brand that last year a majority of voters decided, in a free and fair election, represented their best interests.

What they did not vote for, because it was not part of Trump’s platform or promises, was the weaponization of his office in general, and the FCC in particular, to destroy the democracy of broadcast television.

First by a spurious suit against “60 Minutes,” which many believe was settled to allow the sale of Paramount Global to Skydance Media to go forward, then with CBS (owned by Paramount) canceling “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” and now with the suspension of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

Television is an industry that relies on a continual public voting system — people watch or they don’t watch, and the networks renew, cancel and tweak their programming accordingly. This is an oversimplification of a byzantine and often mysterious system that often involves the personal preferences of network executives and, increasingly, algorithms, but essentially the viewers are in charge — with their eyeballs and, occasionally, their outrage.

If, as the president claims, “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” had been canceled due to its low ratings or suspended after Kimmel’s recent remarks caused longtime viewers to inundate ABC or the show’s sponsors with messages of outrage, fans would have been upset, but it would have been a mere blip in the news cycle.

But that is not what happened. Instead, a handful of conservative pundits who have made it their business to punish anyone who mentions slain influencer Charlie Kirk with anything but near-sanctification used a few ill-chosen but innocuous lines regarding the crime in Kimmel’s opening monologue Monday to call for swift and terrible retribution.

FCC Chairman Brendan Carr answered the call. On the podcast “The Benny Show,” hosted by right-wing political commentator Benny Johnson, he threatened television affiliates with regulatory action if they did not take action against Kimmel.

He did so knowing that Nexstar, which owns many of those affiliates, was attempting to buy Tegna, in order to gain control of over 80% of U.S. television stations. That merger would require not just FCC approval but Carr’s willingness to eliminate the rule that prevents any media company from owning more than 39% of television stations.

Nexstar appeared to do precisely what Carr demanded of them. As did ABC/Disney, which decided that the loss of revenue from these affiliates, and the animosity of Trump and his supporters, posed a bigger threat than the potential fallout from pulling “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” off the air. (And good luck getting the four-time Oscars host to emcee this ceremony again in the future.)

Perhaps it did. But given that “seize the media” and “silence comedians” are historical hallmarks of totalitarianism, the resulting three-day-and-counting news cycle, in which Carr, Trump and Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger have been regularly accused of dismantling democracy, has given anti-MAGA forces a new and legitimate rallying cry.

All while pushing broadcast television just a bit closer to the edge of extinction.

Nexstar denied that it benched Kimmel due to pressure from Carr.

“The decision to preempt ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ was made unilaterally by the senior executive team at Nexstar, and they had no communication with the FCC or any government agency prior to making that decision,” Gary Weitman, Nexstar’s chief communications officer, said in a statement.

Trump’s obsession with broadcast networks and late-night hosts is perilous, and not just because it underlines his desire to attack culture with every means at his disposal (including those that may not be legal).

Certainly, it exposes his authoritarian bent, but it also reveals his anachronistic view of the world.

First, in these divisive times, having critics allows your supporters to coalesce around hating them. And second, broadcast television, including and especially late night, has been in its death throes for more than a decade.

As alarming, unacceptable and authoritarian as the attacks on “60 Minutes,” Colbert and Kimmel are, media freedom is not going to die on this particular hill for the simple reason that it is no longer the free media’s main residence.

Carr ordered his hit on Kimmel not from the comforts of “Fox & Friends” but on a podcast. Trump still delivers televised speeches, but most of his communications and policy decisions are delivered via social media.

The tsunami of corporate mergers involving television networks and streaming services have occurred not because these things are profitable tools of power but because, at least separately, they are not. YouTube is the most popular media platform in the country.

As Trump points out, Kimmel’s television ratings are very low — less than 2 million on average. Kimmel himself has said that he and other late-night shows get far more viewers from clips on social media than on television. If he and Colbert decide to take their voices straight to social media, well, good luck controlling that.

There is certainly much to fear in Trump’s brazen attacks on venerable institutions like “60 Minutes” and late-night television (though with conservatives like Ted Cruz and Tucker Carlson siding, at least in principle, with Kimmel, things may not be going quite the way Carr or Trump planned), but as Kirk knew, one doesn’t need a television show to be an effective, influential voice.

Seen from one angle, Trump is most certainly attempting to quash what we have come to know as democracy. But from another, it’s a grudge-holding president kicking the industry that helped him achieve power when it’s already struggling for breath.

While Thursday’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” was preempted by a rerun of “Celebrity Family Feud,” continuing ABC’s indefinite suspension of the talk show, some of Kimmel’s late-night colleagues used their platform to sound off.

On “The Daily Show,” which airs on Paramount-owned Comedy Central and has rotating hosts, Jon Stewart suited up for emceeing duties outside his usual Monday slot. Desi Lydic had been hosting this week, but the comedian had something to say about the issues surrounding his friend Kimmel.

Stewart leaned heavy into irony from the start of the show, saying it is now the “all new, government-approved” version, and was introduced as the evening’s “patriotically obedient host.” Stewart frequently scolded the audience for laughing at his sarcastic pandering to the Trump administration. He said the show was being taped in the “crime-ridden cesspool that is New York City” and notes that “someone’s National Guard should invade this place, am I right?”

“I don’t know who this ‘Johnny Drimmel Live’ ABC character is, but the point is, our great administration has laid out very clear rules on free speech,” Stewart said. “Some naysayers may argue that this administration’s speech concerns are merely a cynical ploy, a thin gruel of a ruse, a smoke screen to obscure an unprecedented consolidation of power and unitary intimidation, principleless and coldly antithetical to any experiment in a constitutional republic governance. Some people would say that. Not me, though, I think it’s great.”

Stewart and the correspondents then serenaded the president with an off-key tune filled with compliments and praises.

Meanwhile, Jimmy Fallon, host of NBC’s “The Tonight Show,” briefly addressed the situation in his monologue Thursday night saying, “To be honest with you all, I don’t know what’s going on — no one does. But I do know Jimmy Kimmel, and he is a decent, funny and loving guy. And I hope he comes back.”

Fallon said he would continue his monologue “just like I normally would,” but the punchline of his jokes about Trump came with an announcer interrupting any possible slights with flattery.

Earlier in the day, the host had canceled a scheduled appearance at Fast Company’s Innovation Festival in New York City, where he was set to join a panel titled “Staying on Brand”; organizers did not respond to a request for comment about the cancellation of his appearance.

Seth Meyers, host of NBC’s “Late Night,” also didn’t avoid the topic. He opened his segment “A Closer Look” on Thursday by cracking jokes about how anything negative he’s said about the president is an AI-generated deepfake. “I’ve always believed he was a visionary, an innovator, a great president and even better golfer,” he joked.

He proceeded to show clips from Trump’s recent trip to the U.K., poking fun at the president’s comments and protesters who rallied against his visit. But later in the segment, Meyers’ began to show clips of Trump touting his efforts to “stop all government censorship” and bring back free speech, before cutting to news clips about Kimmel’s suspension.

“Trump promised to end government censorship and bring back free speech, and he’s doing the opposite, and it has experts worried that we’re rapidly devolving into an oppressive autocracy in the style of Russia or Hungary, much faster than anyone could have predicted,” Meyers continued.

The host also commented on his personal relationship with Kimmel, saying it’s a “privilege and an honor” to be his friend, in the same way he feels privileged to host his own show. “I wake up every day, I count my blessings that I live in a country that at least purports to value freedom of speech, and we’re going to keep doing our show the way we’ve always done it, with enthusiasm and integrity,” he said.

“The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” added David Remnick, the editor in chief of the New Yorker, to its lineup Thursday, which already included CNN journalist Jake Tapper. Colbert’s show generated its own headlines this summer when CBS announced the late-night talk show would be canceled after the season wraps in May 2026 — effectively ending the franchise after 33 years on the air. The decision, the company said, was due to financial reasons rather than a response to Colbert’s criticism of a deal between the Trump administration and Paramount, the parent company of CBS, the network that airs “The Late Show,” as many have speculated.

Colbert used his vocal talents Thursday to sing a tune about the situation, presenting a short song as a message from ABC and its parent company, Walt Disney. The song was to the tune of “Be Our Guest,” the “Beauty and The Beast” classic — except the repeating refrain is “shut your trap.”

Colbert sings as an animated clip of the candlestick character Lumière from the movie plays, but he’s donning a red MAGA hat here. “Shut your trap, we’re warning you to cut the crap. Our dear leader’s skin is thinner than a sheet of plastic wrap,” he sings.”Mum’s the word, have you heard, kissing a— is what’s preferred. Don’t insult our great dictator or he’ll hit you with this turd,” the song continues as a photo of FCC Chairman Brendan Carr appears on screen.

“The new rule at ABC: Don’t make fun of Donny T,” he sings. “So don’t you make a scene or mention Jeff Epstein, or your show will be scrapped — shut your trap.”

Colbert also spoke about the suspension in a monologue, reading a social media post from Carr that said “While this may be an unprecedented decision, it is important for broadcasters to push back on Disney programming that they determine falls short of community values.”

“You know what my community values are, buster?” Colbert asked. “Freedom of speech.”

Colbert discussed Kimmel’s situation with Tapper, who brought up the Department of Justice’s review of Disney’s deal to take a controlling stake in streaming company FuboTV, which brings up potential antitrust issues. Tapper questioned what Bob Iger, Disney’s chief executive, would do about Kimmel given that he has business before the Justice Department. “Is he going to poke the bear, Donald Trump, or is he going to ignore this great tradition we have in this country, of not acquiescing — of media, newspapers, comedians, television — not acquiescing to power?”

Democratic Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly is also scheduled to appear in an episode of “The Late Show” airing Monday; Kelly last appeared on the show last year ahead of the November 2024 presidential election, discussing border security and gun reform.

Earlier on Thursday, while taking part in a panel conversation moderated by the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, late-night veteran David Letterman, who once helmed “The Late Show” on CBS, described this week’s turn of events as “misery.”

“In the world of somebody who’s an authoritarian, maybe a dictatorship, sooner or later, everyone is going to be touched,” Letterman said. He first addressed what transpired with Colbert and the cancellation of “The Late Show,” alluding to political pressure as the real culprit, before addressing the decision to yank Kimmel’s show.

“I just feel bad about this because we all see where this is going, correct?” he said. “It’s managed media. And it’s no good. It’s silly. It’s ridiculous. And you can’t go around firing somebody because you’re fearful or trying to suck up to an authoritarian — a criminal — administration in the Oval Office. That’s just not how this works.”

With three decades in the late-night circuit, Letterman never shied from mocking presidents: “Beating up on these people,” he said, “rightly or wrongly, accurately or perhaps inaccurately, in the name of comedy — not once were we squeezed by anyone from any government agency, let alone the dreaded FCC.”

ABC carried out the decision to take Kimmel off the air Wednesday after the comedian and host made comments about conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s death during his opening monologue on Monday night.

“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.

Kimmel has not yet commented publicly on the matter. But his show’s suspension quickly ignited fierce debate, with critics accusing ABC and its parent company, Disney, of capitulating to political pressure. Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, said Wednesday that his agency might take action against ABC because of Kimmel’s comments.

“This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney,” Carr said on the Benny Johnson podcast. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

President Trump lauded Kimmel’s suspension in a post he wrote on his Truth Social media site: “Great News for America: The ratings challenged Jimmy Kimmel Show is CANCELLED.” (The show has not been canceled, but remains on hold.)

It’s also worth noting Kimmel’s outspoken daytime counterparts were mum on the issue. “The View’s” panelists did not address the Kimmel situation during Thursday’s episode. (“Good Morning America,” which is produced by ABC News, did mention the news of the Kimmel hiatus without additional commentary.)

Meanwhile, Kimmel’s fictional late-night competitor, Deborah Vance, has an opinion on the ordeal — or rather, actor Jean Smart does. She may only play a late-night television host on TV, but the “Hacks” actress was quick to share her thoughts on the decision to pull Kimmel from the air: “What Jimmy said was FREE speech, not hate speech,” Smart shared in an Instagram post. “People seem to only want to protect free speech when its suits THEIR agenda.” (Kimmel made a cameo in the recent season of “Hacks.”)

She went on to write: “Thought I didn’t agree at ALL with Charlie Kirk; his shooting death sickened me; and should have sickened any decent human being. What is happening to our country?”

WASHINGTON — At a banquet table fit for a king, but set specially for him, President Trump called his state visit to the United Kingdom this week “one of the highest honors of my life.”

He then proceeded to tell guests at the white tie event that the United States was “a very sick country” last year before becoming “the hottest” again under his rule.

During a news conference with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the Chequers estate Thursday, hailing a bilateral deal on artificial intelligence investments said to be worth hundreds of billions of dollars, Trump called America’s relationship with Britain “unbreakable,” bigger than any single esoteric policy disagreement.

But he quickly pivoted from magnanimity on the world stage, denying the results of his 2020 election defeat and calling exclusively on conservative reporters, who asked questions about Britain’s Christian nature and his predecessor’s alleged use of an autopen.

It was a familiar study in contrasts from the president, who routinely mixes diplomacy with domestic politics in his meetings with foreign leaders. Yet the sound of Trump engaging in fractious political discourse — not at the White House or a political event in Florida or Missouri, but inside Britain’s most revered halls — struck a discordant tone.

The Mirror, a national British tabloid aligned with Starmer’s Labour Party, wrote that Trump’s “wild … political rant” at Windsor Castle alongside King Charles III “seriously broke royal protocol.”

On Wednesday evening, as the formal banquet concluded, Trump took to his social media platform to designate a far left-wing political movement called Antifa as “a major terrorist organization,” describing the group as “A SICK, DANGEROUS, RADICAL LEFT DISASTER.”

President Trump appears with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at a news conference Thursday at Chequers near Aylesbury, England.

(Evan Vucci / Associated Press)

The move prompted a question to Starmer at the Chequers news conference from a right-ring reporter on whether he would consider taking similar action against leftist British groups.

“We obviously will take decisions for ourselves. I don’t want to comment on the decisions of the president,” Starmer said. “But we take our decisions ourselves.”

In another exchange, Trump repeated dramatically exaggerated figures on the number of undocumented migrants who entered the United States during the Biden administration, as well as false claims about the 2020 presidential election.

“I don’t want to be controversial, but you see what’s happened, and you see all the information that’s come out,” Trump said. “We won in 2020, big. And I said, let’s run. We gotta run. Because I saw what’s happening.”

The Royal Family went beyond its own rule book to show Trump extraordinary hospitality, honoring the president’s arrival with a 41-gun salute typically reserved for special, domestic occasions, such as the king’s birthday.

King Charles was hosting Trump for an unprecedented second state visit — a gesture never before extended to an American president — after the king’s mother, Queen Elizabeth II, greeted him at Windsor in 2019.

“That’s a first and maybe that’s going to be the last time. I hope it is, actually,” Trump said in his banquet speech, prompting the king to chuckle and balk.

At the stunning dinner, along a table seating 160 people in St. George’s Hall, guests were offered a 1912 cognac honoring the birth year of the president’s Scottish-born mother, as well as a whiskey cocktail inspired by his heritage. The president, for his part, does not drink.

First Lady Melania Trump, left, President Trump, U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Lady Victoria Starmer watch the Red Devils parachute display team at Chequers, the country home of the British prime minister, on Thursday.

(Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images)

But it is unclear whether the king’s soft-power diplomacy helped shift Trump closer to London’s priorities on foreign affairs. A growing chorus in Britain opposes Israel’s continued military operations in Gaza, and major U.K. parties are aligned on a moral and strategic need to support Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.

“Our countries have the closest defense, security and intelligence relationship ever known,” Charles said at the dinner. “In two world wars, we fought together to defeat the forces of tyranny.

“Today, as tyranny once again threatens Europe, we and our allies stand together in support of Ukraine, to deter aggression and secure peace,” the king added.

A king’s request for Europe

Trump’s reciprocal remarks did not mention Ukraine. But at Chequers, the president repeated his general disappointment with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the ongoing war, a conflict Putin has escalated with attacks on civilians and the British Council building in Kyiv since meeting with Trump in Alaska a month ago.

“He’s let me down. He’s really let me down,” said Trump, offering no details on what steps he might take next.

Starmer, pressing to leverage the pomp of Trump’s state visit for actionable policy change, said that a coordinated response to Putin’s aggression would be forthcoming and “decisive.”

“In recent days, Putin has shown his true face, mounting the biggest attack since the invasion began, with yet more bloodshed, yet more innocents killed, and unprecedented violations of NATO airspace,” Starmer said, referencing Russia’s Sept. 9 drone flights over Poland. “These are not the actions of someone who wants peace.”

“It’s only when the president has put pressure on Putin,” Starmer added, “that he’s actually shown any inclination to move.”

The hugely popular star of ABC’s lineup was known as an outspoken critic of the president of the United States. But when one comment sparked an outrage, the network moved swiftly to yank the entertainer off the air.

It was May 2018, and the star was Roseanne Barr.

Hollywood reacted in shock when ABC abruptly pulled the plug on “Roseanne,” the top-rated reboot of the sitcom about the Conner family and their struggles with harsh economic difficulties. Barr’s reunion with her television family was an instant hit, becoming the most successful TV series on the network in years.

The cancellation came just hours after Barr posted a response to a tweet about a WikiLeaks report claiming that the CIA spied on French presidential candidates during the Obama administration. The comedian made a reference to Valerie Jarrett, a former aide of former President Obama, as the offspring of the Muslim Brotherhood and the “Planet of the Apes” film franchise.

Although Barr, a vocal supporter of Donald Trump in his first presidential term, had long been a fiery presence on social media, the racism of the barb was undeniable. Executives at the Walt Disney Co.-owned broadcaster said that the post crossed a line, rejecting Barr’s apology and pleas for forgiveness.

“Roseanne’s Twitter statement is abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values, and we have decided to cancel her show,” announced then-ABC Entertainment President Channing Dungey. Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger later tweeted about the cancellation, “There was only one thing to do here, and that was the right thing.”

The incident had echoes of Wednesday’s announcement that ABC was pulling “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” indefinitely in the wake of sharp backlash over Kimmel’s comments about slain right-wing activist Charlie Kirk. The late-night host said during the monologue on his show Monday that Tyler Robinson, the Utah man accused in the shooting death of Kirk, might have been a pro-Trump Republican.

The network’s decision to suspend the show came after Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr suggested on a right-wing podcast Wednesday that the FCC could take action against ABC for Kimmel’s comments. Within hours of Carr’s comments, Nexstar Media Group said it would pull the show from its ABC affiliate stations, and Walt Disney Co., which owns ABC, followed suit, saying it was pulling Kimmel from the network.

Barr on Thursday jumped into the fray over the pulling of Kimmel’s show, firing off a response to Obama’s post on X, formerly Twitter, saying that the Trump administration was taking “cancel culture” to “a new and dangerous level.”

“Remember when you and your wife called Bob Iger to have me fired?” Barr wrote in a repost of his message.

There were no reports or indications that the Obamas had any involvement with the cancellation of “Roseanne.”

Less than six months later, “The Conners,” a spinoff of “Roseanne,” premiered to high ratings. The series picked up the story of the working class family, who were grieving over the death of matriarch Roseanne Conner, who had overdosed on opioids. The comedy became a staple of ABC’s primetime, concluding its seven-season run in April.

In a 2023 Times interview promoting her stand-up special on Fox Nation, Barr called the cancellation “a witch-burning,” lashing out at the network and her former co-stars.

“I felt like the devil himself was coming against me to try to tear me apart, to punish me for believing in God,” she said. “And they denied me the right to apologize. Oh my God, they just hated me so badly. I had never known that they hated me like that. They hate me because I have talent, because I have an opinion. Even though ‘Roseanne’ became their No. 1 show, they’d rather not have a No. 1 show.”

She added, “It didn’t faze them to murder my character, either. They s— on my contribution to television and the show itself. But I forgive everybody. I started thinking that God took me out of there to save me. And once I started thinking that way, I was, like, a lot better off.”

On a Wednesday podcast, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr said ABC had to act on Jimmy Kimmel’s comments about the killing of right wing activist Charlie Kirk. “We can do it the easy way or the hard way,” the Trump appointee told right-wing commentator Benny Johnson.

The intended audience, the owners of ABC stations across the country, heard the message loud and clear. They chose the easy way.

Within hours of Carr’s comments, Nexstar, which controls 32 ABC affiliates, agreed to drop “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” indefinitely.

Walt Disney Co.-owned ABC quickly followed with its own announcement that it was pulling Kimmel from the network. Sinclair Broadcasting, a TV station company long sympathetic to conservative causes, also shelved the show and went a step further by demanding that Kimmel make a financial contribution to Kirk’s family and his conservative advocacy organization Turning Point USA.

It is not clear if or when Kimmel’s show will return. On Thursday, high-level ABC executives spoke with Kimmel and his team to see whether there was a way to “bring the temperature down,” allowing the show to return, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to comment.

The situation reflects the power that Carr has over the companies with outlets that still reach the largest audiences in the U.S., even in the age of streaming. Over-the-air TV and radio stations are the only media licensed by the government due to their use of the public airwaves, and Carr, whose commitment to President Trump is unwavering, holds the keys to their future.

Companies that own TV stations are desperate to make acquisition or merger deals so they can compete with the clout of tech companies. Nexstar, for example, needs the FCC’s permission for a proposed $6.2-billion acquisition of rival station operator Tegna, and other companies are expected to swap and acquire outlets as well. All deals have to get approval of the FCC, which is also being lobbied to lift the cap on how much of the U.S. station owners can cover.

That gives Carr tremendous leverage.

The latest trouble for Kimmel started Monday when he seemed to suggest during his monologue that Tyler Robinson, the Utah man accused in the shooting death of Kirk, might have been a pro-Trump Republican. He said MAGA supporters “are 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.”

Carr, during Johnson’s podcast, called Kimmel’s comments “the sickest conduct possible.” Carr, who has previously styled himself as a free speech absolutist, argues that stations have the right to pull the show if owners believe the content conflicts with community standards.

“Broadcast TV stations have always been required by their licenses to operate in the public interest — that includes serving the needs of their local communities,” he wrote Thursday on X. “And broadcasters have long retained the right to not air national programs that they believe are inconsistent with the public interest, including their local communities’ values. I am glad to see that many broadcasters are responding to their viewers as intended.”

Kimmel’s staff was told not to report to work Thursday but has been given no information about the program’s future. Kimmel has yet to comment.

Top Disney executives, including Chief Executive Bob Iger — who has a close relationship with the host — and Dana Walden, co-chairman of Disney Entertainment, made the decision to bench Kimmel.

Disney executives had been huddling as the crisis mounted throughout Wednesday and Kimmel and his staff had been preparing the show. The comedian planned to address the situation, according to three people close to the situation who were not authorized to speak publicly.

Some Disney execs were belatedly uncomfortable with Kimmel’s monologue, which became a lightning rod for conservatives on social media. Walden spoke with Kimmel on Wednesday, one of the knowledgeable sources said, and she and other executives became concerned that Kimmel’s planned remarks were “pretty emotional” and “did not strike the right tone.”

With only about an hour before the show was set to begin taping, the ABC executives felt they did not have time to work out an appropriate response and decided to suspend the show rather than risk an escalation of the cultural tensions, one of the sources said.

The call to dump Kimmel by Nexstar, whose founder and CEO Perry Sook has praised the administration and said lifting station ownership restrictions was the company’s top priority, put pressure on Disney to act because of the number of affiliate stations it owns.

Losing Kimmel would be a major blow to ABC.

While late-night ratings are in decline and profits on his show have greatly diminished, Kimmel is a recognizable personality who is strongly identified with the network. He has emceed the Emmys and the Oscars, and hosted game shows in addition to “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” He’s also the current host of ABC’s “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” After years of ABC being a non-entity in late-night TV, Kimmel put the network in the game when he arrived in 2003 after hosting popular shows on Comedy Central.

Trump and Kimmel have long sparred. Tensions date back to 2017, when Trump first moved into the White House and Kimmel poked fun at the new president from the Oscars stage. The comedian’s position on Trump hardened, and grew more personal, later that year after he and his wife nearly lost their infant son who was born with a rare heart condition.

Kimmel then advocated for the preservation of the Affordable Care Act, which had been a Trump target. The rift widened last year at the Oscars when Trump posted a harsh review of Kimmel on Truth Social in real time, asking whether there had ever been a worse emcee.

Kimmel read the post during the telecast, then looked at the camera and said: “Thank you for watching. I’m surprised you’re still — isn’t it past your jail time?” Since then Trump has called for Kimmel’s cancellation.

Trump has long been comedic fodder for late-night hosts, and now he is exacting his revenge with Carr’s help. He called for the firing of Stephen Colbert ahead of CBS’ decision to cancel his program, “The Late Show,” for financial reasons. That decision came after Colbert blasted parent company Paramount’s decision to pay $16 million to settle a Trump lawsuit — a move he and many others speculated was made to get FCC approval of its merger deal with Skydance Media.

Trump has also gone after NBC’s late-night hosts Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers, saying they should be next on the chopping block.

The chilling effect is already evident on ABC. “The View,” the network’s daytime talk program that airs live and regularly skewers Trump, made no mention of the Kimmel controversy on Thursday. The story was covered briefly on the network’s “Good Morning America.”

Prominent writer-producer Damon Lindelof (a creator of ABC’s hit drama “Lost” and HBO’s “The Leftovers”) posted on Instagram that he was “shocked, saddened and infuriated” by Kimmel’s suspension. Lindelof wrote he could not “in good conscience work” for Disney if the company failed to bring Kimmel back.

Disney’s action was quickly condemned by Hollywood unions, progressive groups, free speech organizations and Democratic politicians.

“The right to speak our minds and to disagree with each other — to disturb, even — is at the very heart of what it means to be a free people,” the Writers Guild of America West and East chapters said in a statement. “It is not to be denied. Not by violence, not by the abuse of governmental power, nor by acts of corporate cowardice.”

“If free speech applied only to ideas we like, we needn’t have bothered to write it into the Constitution,” the writers group said. “Shame on those in government who forget this founding truth. As for our employers, our words have made you rich. Silencing us impoverishes the whole world.”

Tino Gagliardi, international president of the American Federation of Musicians, which includes members of Kimmel’s band, added: “This is not complicated. Trump’s FCC identified speech it did not like and threatened ABC with extreme reprisals. This is state censorship.”

Four prominent unions, including Directors Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA, issued a joint statement saying that the removal of Kimmel “under government pressure” has added further uncertainty to the Hollywood workforce, which already has been reeling from a cutback in film and television production.

FCC Commissioner Anna M. Gomez, the lone Democrat on the three-member panel, said the agency “does not have the authority, the ability, or the constitutional right to police content or punish broadcasters for speech the government dislikes.” Gomez also was sharply critical of Disney, calling out what she called as “cowardly corporate capitulation.”

Disney has not commented beyond its initial announcement.

Gomez referenced an incident earlier in the week, when Trump threatened ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl after the president bristled over a question Karl asked about a crackdown on free speech. Trump said Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi might “go after” the reporter “because you treat me so unfairly.”

“We cannot allow an inexcusable act of political violence to be twisted into a justification for government censorship and control,” Gomez said.

Anze Kopitar, widely considered the greatest player in Kings franchise history and poised to become the team’s all-time leading scorer, announced Thursday he will retire at the end of the 2025-26 season.

Entering his 20th season with the Kings and the final year of his contract, the decision was somewhat expected from the 38-year-old team captain. He told KCAL News last month he was thinking about retirement and that it could be his last NHL season.

Kings general manager Ken Holland told NHL Network Radio in July that Kopitar indicated he wasn’t seeking a contract extension this summer and was intending to take things a “year at a time.”

Kopitar’s announcement came only hours after Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw announced he would retire at the end of the season.

Kopitar’s Hall of Fame credentials have already been established. The greatest player ever from Slovenia, he helped lead the Kings to the franchise’s Stanley Cup victories in 2012 and 2014 as part of a core four that included Dustin Brown, Jonathan Quick and Drew Doughty.

Kopitar is second all-time in franchise scoring, with 1,278 points in a franchise-leading 1,454 games played. He is 30 points away from breaking Marcel Dionne’s team record for most points (1,307). He ranks third all-time in franchise goals (440) behind Luc Robitaille (557) and Dionne (550) and leads in assists (838). He is a two-time Selke trophy winner (best defensive forward) and three-time Lady Byng trophy winner (gentlemanly play).

Drafted 11th overall by the Kings in 2005, Kopitar made an immediate impact during his 2006-07 rookie season, finishing with 20 goals and 61 points for a downtrodden team that was in the middle of a six-year playoff drought.

Kings center Anze Kopitar celebrates with the Stanley Cup after the Kings defeated the New Jersey Devils to win the franchise’s first title in 2012.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Eventually, with Doughty joining the team in 2008 coupled with steady growth from Brown, Quick and Kopitar, the Kings returned to the playoffs in 2010 before capturing the franchise’s first Stanley Cup in 2012.

Kopitar has stood out on a team that has had many greats, including NHL all-time leading scorer Wayne Gretzky.

“It’s really hard for me to sit here and say I’m the greatest King. That’s just not my personality. Far from it,” Kopitar told The Times’ Helene Elliott in 2023. “There’s been great Kings in this organization, with Marcel, Luc, Dave [Taylor], Wayne, Blakey [Rob Blake]. The list can go on for a little bit. Brownie. Individually, yes, but it’s about collective wins.”

With Kopitar’s decision, the biggest roster question facing the Kings remains whether they can re-sign Adrian Kempe to a long-term deal. Kempe, who has led the team in points the last two seasons, is in the final year of his contract.

The Kings open the preseason Sunday against the Ducks in the Empire Classic at Toyota Arena in Ontario. They begin the regular season against the Colorado Avalanche at Crypto.com Arena on Oct. 7.

This is a developing story. The Times will have more on Kopitar’s decision to retire at the end of the season soon.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Thursday blocked President Trump’s administration from immediately deporting Guatemalan migrant children who came to the U.S. alone back to their home country, the latest step in a court struggle over one of the most sensitive issues in Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly comes after the Republican administration’s Labor Day weekend attempt to remove Guatemalan migrant children who were living in government shelters and foster care.

There was already a temporary order in place preventing the removal of Guatemalan children. But that was set to expire Tuesday.

Kelly, who was appointed by Trump, granted a preliminary injunction extends that temporary protection indefinitely, although the government can appeal.

There are also temporary restraining orders in separate cases in Arizona and Illinois, but those cases are much more narrow in the scope of children they cover.

ABC has cancelled Jimmy Kimmel Live! indefinitely after the veteran host, Jimmy Kimmel, made several comments about the reaction to Charlie Kirk’s assassination

Jimmy Kimmel is said to be “p*ssed” over ABC’s decision to axe his late-night show indefinitely.

Jimmy Kimmel Live! has been scrapped following the veteran host’s divisive comments about the reaction to Charlie Kirk’s assassination on Monday and Tuesday’s shows. A group of ABC-affiliated stations said it would not air the programme, citing the remarks broadcast less than one week after the killing as the reason.

But the star, who has hosted and been executive producer of the show since 2003, “isn’t going to take this lightly,” according to sources. One insider said: “Jimmy is p*ssed over the decision to suspend him and the show and he isn’t going to take this lightly, as he is actively looking for ways to get out of his contract. This is the last straw and Jimmy is now looking to forever break his relationship with ABC forever.”

READ MORE: News reporter blasted for ‘jaw-dropping’ response to Charlie Kirk killer’s messagesREAD MORE: Charlie Kirk shooting: Tyler Robinson wears anti-suicide vest in court charged with murder

Kimmel’s comments included: “Many in MAGA land are working very hard to capitalise on the murder of Charlie Kirk.” He also said on Monday’s programme: “We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterise this kid ‘who murdered’ Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”

These were deemed “offensive and insensitive” by Nexstar Communications Group, which operates 23 ABC affiliates, and ABC itself moved swiftly on Wednesday. Kimmel, himself, is yet to comment on ABC’s move but President Donald Trump brazenly posted on Truth Social: “Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done.”

READ MORE: Trump makes ‘creepy’ comment about Attorney General Pam Bondi in Cabinet meeting

Kimmel’s contract is up in May next year, though, and insiders believe he is now “looking for ways to get out” of the deal. It is believed Kimmel, 57, is set to go on Stephen Colbert’s show in the US in the coming days as Colbert – a Democrat – has also been criticised by Mr Trump after his show was axed by CBS in the summer.

The source told the Daily Mail: “They both are in the same predicament with being against the Trump administration, and they are now looking to do something together to fight for what they believe in. They both don’t want Trump to win in any way or fashion at all, and this has lit an extreme fire under Jimmy’s a** to continue to tell it like it is and be real to himself.”

The suspect in the Kirk case is Tyler Robinson, a young man who grew up in a conservative household in southern Utah but was enmeshed in “leftist ideology.” His parents told investigators he had turned politically left and pro-LGBTQ rights in the last year.

JAKE PAUL’s shock showdown with the controversial Gervonta Davis is seemingly in limbo.

The pair, 28 and 30 respectively, are set to lock horns in a seemingly open weight showdown on November 14.

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The fight, which has been maligned due to the immense height and weight differences between the pair, was slated to take place at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, Georgia.

But it’s seemingly now in need of a new venue after Most Valuable Promotions, which was founded by Paul and his business partner Nikisa Bidarian, withdrew event permits and rule waivers required to stage the bout in the state.

Chairman of the Georgia Athletic and Entertainment Commission Rick Thompson revealed the news.

He told USA Today: “I believe it’s in the public’s interest to know that because they’ve been promoting something they should not have been.”

Despite MVP’s withdrawal of the necessary event permits, tickets for the fight are still available and it’s still listed on State Farm’s official website.

But Robert A. Sinners, the Communications Director for the Office of Secretary of State, insisted: “[The fight] will not be happening here.”

Neither Paul, nor Bidarian have commented on the major issue.

Bidarian, however, has teased an imminent announcement regarding the fight.

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He wrote on X early on Monday morning: “Major Jake Paul vs Tank Davis event announcement this Wednesday.”

Former Disney star Paul was last in action in June against ex-WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr, over whom he laboured to a decision victory.

And ‘The Problem Child’ is champing at the bit to share the ring with Davis.

He said: “Gervonta is an angry little elf who has been disrespecting my name for too long.

“His nickname might be ‘Tank’, but I’m an FPV drone and I’m about to disable his a**.

“Yes, he is one of the top pound-for-pound boxers in the world, but my motto is anyone, anytime, anyplace, against all odds.

“And I like my odds. First, I am going to kill David, then I will go on to slaughter Goliath.”