Media Research Center comedy cop Alex Christy’s battle against Jimmy Kimmel extended to his summer replacement hosts. We’ve already noted that Christy lashed out at Kimmel’s first replacement, Tiffany Haddish, for arguing that President Trump’s defense of U.S. soccer player Folarin Balogun after he received a red card in the World Cup was the first time President Trump has “ever defended a black person.” Christy spent a July 8 post ranting at Haddish again this time because the U.S. soccer team lost despite Trump’s intervention:
Over on ABC and Jimmy Kimmel Live! guest host Tiffany Haddish reacted to Team USA’s loss, “People are blaming Donald Trump for the loss after he got FIFA to help Team USA. It seems like everything Trump touches dies. Which I guess is why his tiny hands are all [bleep]ed up or maybe that’s from grabbing Nikki’s barbs by the [bleep]. I’m glad some of y’all got that joke because it seemed like there’s not enough black people in the audience to know what a barb is.”
Christy then ran to Trump’s defense:
It is not disputed that Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino had a conversation, but there is no evidence to suggest Trump is the reason why Balogun was allowed to play. FIFA set the precedent for the reversing red card suspensions earlier in the tournament. The U.S. lost because Belgium was simply the better team. There’s no need to make everything about Trump.
Sad that Christy must defend Trump in such a servile manner. He whined about Haddish again in a July 9 post:
Jimmy Kimmel Live! guest host Tiffany Haddish tried a little too hard on ABC on Wednesday to portray herself as the latest victim in President Trump’s battle with the late night comedians. Despite Trump himself saying nothing about Haddish and the White House statement only coming after a reporter’s question about Tuesday’s show, Haddish claimed, “This is the day that I finally became Jimmy Kimmel!” and wondered if she would still get paid if Trump succeeded in pulling her off the air.
Haddish began by cueing up a clip of herself from Tuesday and declaring, “The president is very focused on issues that matter right now, and apparently, I’m one of them. I got a shoutout from the White House today. For real, y’all. For real. They issued an official statement about this joke I made last night.”
In the clip, Haddish quipped that “People are blaming Donald Trump for the loss after he got FIFA to help Team USA. It seems like everything Trump touches dies. Which, I guess, is why his tiny hands are all [bleep]ed up. Or maybe that’s from grabbing Nikki’s barbs by the [bleep].”
Thoughtful viewers would then observe Haddish moving the goalposts as she switched from “the president” being focused on her to a spokesperson responding to a press inquiry as she ranted:
Christy then turned his hire to Kimmel despite the fact that he was on vacation:
Turning to sidekick Guillermo Rodriguez, Haddish asked, “I do got one question, though. If the president pulls me off the air, do I still get paid for the whole week? Do you know, Guillermo? Do I get paid?”
Rodriguez joked that she wouldn’t, but more importantly, Kimmel himself wasn’t even pulled off the air because of Trump or something he said about Trump. He was suspended by ABC for comments about conservatives pushing back against conspiracy theories related to Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin’s political beliefs and then not realizing he did anything wrong after the criticism intensified.
Needless to say, Christy didn’t mention the fact that his employer demanded that ABC fire Trump over the remark, or that Trump’s FCC chairman, Brendan Carr, effectively threatened ABC into punishing Kimmel.
The following week, Ike Barinholtz was the guest host, and Christy lashed out at him too in a July 14 post that, yes, whined some more about Kimmel:
Actor and comedian Ike Barinholtz became this year’s second summer guest host of ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! on Monday and the second to try to claim they are following in Kimmel’s footsteps by becoming a free speech martyr. What made Barinholtz’s claim extra dumb is that he tried to do so preemptively as he attacked Sen. Mitch McConnell after his hospitalization as a health care hypocrite and Sen. Lindsey Graham after his unexpected death by joking with sidekick Guillermo Rodriguez that they had nothing nice to say about him.
In Barinholtz’s world, if you do not agree with him about the economics of health insurance, you do not want people to have health care at all, “In all seriousness, though, I do want to extend well wishes to Senator McConnell. I hope you get the quality health care you’ve fought so hard to deny everyone else, so thank you. Pulling for you, Mitch.”
Barinholtz then started to change topics to Graham’s death, but first he had to do some preemptive self-pity, “What a weekend. What a crazy weekend. Mitch McConnell is alive. Lindsey Graham is dead. There’s so many opportunities to get Jimmy’s show pulled off the air again. They’re gonna to pull it off!”
[…]For liberals, Jimmy Kimmel is a free speech hero for getting himself suspended. The actual details of what he said don’t matter to them. Kimmel’s guest hosts are now trying to get in on the hero status by trying to force free speech narratives into existence. In Barinholtz’s case, he is being cruel for the sake of getting a reaction to bolster his liberal street cred, and that says more about him than it does McConnell, Graham, or any of Kimmel’s critics.
Speaking of whining, Christy did that about Barinholtz the next day:
The fast-growing trend of gratuitously nasty, guest-hosted Jimmy Kimmel Live! episodes continued on ABC on Tuesday with Ike Barinholtz once again deciding to make fun of the dead. Not only did Barinholtz continue to attack Sen. Lindsey Graham on personal terms, he also attacked his sister and replacement, Darlene Graham Nardone. According to Barinholtz, Nardone has pledged “to suck” President Trump’s “tits even harder” than Graham did.
[…]On the whole, Kimmel’s guest hosts have been considerably less political than him. There are usually a few who go hard on politics, but there have also been those who seek to avoid the subject. Thus far, Kimmel’s 2026 substitutes have been as nasty or even nastier than him, and with Rosie O’Donnell still waiting in the wings, it is likely to get worse. Barinholtz seems to view his week as host as a way to try to force himself into the top ranks of other anti-Trump celebrities, and if he has to ridicule a grieving sister and her deceased brother, then that is a price he is willing to pay.
We would remind Christy that his MRC co-workers were totally cool with Rush Limbaugh viciously smearing a woman for taking birth control.