Senate Judiciary Committee member Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) presides over a subcommittee hearing hearing in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on June 3, 2025 in Washington, DC.
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Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas sharply criticized Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr for his comments related to late-night host Jimmy Kimmel shortly before ABC pulled his show off the air.
Cruz accused Carr of threatening to cancel ABC’s broadcast license over Kimmel’s remarks about the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“He says, ‘We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way,'” the senator said of Carr on his podcast, “Verdict with Ted Cruz.”
“And I gotta say, that’s right out of Goodfellas,” Cruz said, referring to the classic mob film.
“That’s right out of a mafioso coming into a bar going, ‘Nice bar you have here, it’d be a shame if something happened to it.'”
Cruz noted that he was no fan of Kimmel’s, and said he is “thrilled that he was fired” over his comments about Kirk.
“But let me tell you, if the government gets in the business of saying we don’t say what you the media have said, we’re going to ban you from the airwaves if you don’t say what we like, that will end up bad for conservatives.,” Cruz said.
Kimmel, who has been suspended but not fired, said in his opening monologue Monday night that “the MAGA gang” is “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.”
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Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal, which owns CNBC. Versant would become the new parent company of CNBC upon Comcast’s planned spinoff of Versant.
