Rosie O'Donnell is preparing to sit in for Jimmy Kimmel later this month, and she wants everyone, including Donald Trump, to know she isn't dialing anything back.
A Fight Two Decades in the Making
O'Donnell's rivalry with Trump stretches back nearly 20 years, and on Monday's episode of the On With Kara Swisher podcast, she traced it further, to what she called their shared Long Island roots. She said Trump never forgave her for calling him out as a “grifter” and “logo slapper” rather than the self-made businessman he presents himself as. Asked by soccer star Megan Rapinoe how she'd handle him as Kimmel's guest host, O'Donnell said she plans on “giving it to him in a comedic, honest, truthful, way.”
The Parody ABC Wouldn't Clear
O'Donnell revealed the network told her she couldn't perform an anti-Trump rewrite of “If I Only Had a Brain” from The Wizard of Oz, a bit she used to do on her own talk show in the late '90s, because ABC couldn't secure rights for political content. She sang a few lines anyway on the podcast, unfiltered. She'll instead debut a milder, still pointed parody of “Hello, Dolly” on her first night behind Kimmel's desk.
What are they gonna say, that you can’t say that? I don’t listen to them. I don’t pay any heed to them.
Rosie O'Donnell
The FCC's Gender Identity Inquiry
O'Donnell's defiance lands against a specific backdrop: an FCC inquiry, opened this year under chairman Brendan Carr, examining whether children's programming with gender identity themes should carry special parental warnings. GLAAD has called the effort “an attempt to manipulate the media, erode freedom of speech, and harm LGBTQ Americans.” Legal experts note the FCC likely lacks authority to dictate ratings content, and any move to single out transgender characters would raise First Amendment concerns.
Worth Considering
The gap between the FCC's stated concern and the actual complaint volume is worth sitting with. Regulators are pursuing warning labels for a problem parents, by their own survey responses, mostly don't report having. That mismatch is exactly why O'Donnell's shrug lands: an agency with limited legal footing is easier to defy on a podcast than on a network broadcast, which is presumably why ABC still nixed her Oz parody even as she vents freely elsewhere.
I feel it's my responsibility to stand up for this country that has given me so much.
Rosie O'Donnell
O'Donnell begins her run on Jimmy Kimmel Live! on August 17, with whatever restraint ABC's lawyers can manage.
Cover photo: chattingjason (Jason Chatting), CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
