Benny Johnson hates Jimmy Kimmel more than anyone on earth
Are we doomed to live the same cycle of uproars over and over again?
You’re here because you’re watching politics get body-slammed by digital culture and content creators. I’m here because I’m the only one who can guide you through it.
What feels like one million years ago (2021), I pitched a series called “We’ve Been Here Before.”
Two things prompted the idea. One, 2020 being the literal craziest year imaginable, and two, this entry in my Meme Hall of Fame.
Versions of that meme — Squidward, raccoons, Lord of the Rings — have been going viral periodically since March 21, 2020, when Twitter user @aardvarsk posted: “I am tired of being a part of a major historical event.” Those 12 words still have my vote to be inscribed above the door to the 2020s.
For us millennial cuspers, our elders, the media, and our teachers never let us forget that we joined the world at a very strange time in its life. You know … wars, recessions, various epidemics, tech proliferation, political polarization, existential climate threat, what have you.
The constant reminder that we’re navigating uncharted waters has made many of us into the anxious wrecks you know and love today. There came a point in the COVID era when I discovered that seeking out historical parallels — no matter how distant — provided a rare illusion of control. Hence, “we’ve been here before.” An exhale naturally follows.
All these years later, I’ve remained really firm in my belief that for those of us that are sick of living in unprecedented times, it can be a psychological salve to be reminded that we’re not singular in our experiences. It’s comforting to know that history sees you and can answer your call with advice of its own.
This practice lasted me a good six years before I started noticing people jumping at any chance to run shit back. Realizing “we’ve been here before” requires some tangible amount of cushion for it to be comfortable rather than caustic. Coordinated political attacks are kind of like boob jobs: You have to let it settle before you make any decisions about going back for more.
That’s how I feel about MAGA influencers squaring up for round two of the Jimmy Kimmel Knockout Challenge. Talk about “we’ve been here before” — did we not just fucking do this? I’d argue the only thing worse than constantly living through watershed moments is constantly reliving the same watershed moment on repeat.
As I write this, news broke that a grand jury has indicted former FBI Dir. James Comey, running back the play the Trump admin tried to make last year. Yet again getting stabbed with the dull knife of déjà vu.
How Kimmel caught fire again, what’s different about Benny Johnson’s attack this time, who looks like the biggest hypocrite, and why I’m holding my tongue on the left … all below!
THE ANATOMY OF A CLIP
Melania posted her statement urging ABC to “take a stand” against Jimmy Kimmel at 10:19AM on Monday, April 27. The segment that featured the “expectant widow” joke aired on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” just shy of three days and 23 hours earlier. Here’s how it popped.
Friday — The highest performing post I saw that referenced the exact joke about the first lady came from an Occupy Democrats post on Facebook (94,000 likes). A random user copied and pasted that post onto Twitter for another 377,000 views — but no added buzz.
This should help emphasize how few waves the skit made online in real time.
Saturday — Literally zero social traction. None.
Sunday — This is a story of how embedded video can reach millions of minds, including Melania’s.
🔗 10:28AM: first link share to the monologue on YouTube goes viral (1.7M) — via Byron York, Washington Examiner
🖼️ 11:27AM: first screenshot of Kimmel’s direct quote gains traction (350k) — via Gina Milan, MAGA influencer
📹 1:20PM: first video — only 0:08 seconds long — goes viral (2.4M) — via libby emmons, The Post Millennial
Commence snowball effect via embeds and engagement from key influencers:
2:14PM — End Wokeness, 1.3M views
2:30PM — Meghan McCain, 1.9M views … “so deeply sick of … the hate he spreads”
2:56PM — Sen. Mike Lee, 431k views … “not cool”
3:48PM — Patrick Bet-David, 1M views … “that’s dangerous rhetoric”
3:59PM — Libs of TikTok, 1M views … “this has to stop”
4:32PM — Bo Loudon, only 12k views … but relevant as Barron’s bff
5:40PM — Breaking911, 15.4M views
Tracing the genome of a clip … it’s just what I do. Any of the posts listed above could’ve served as an entry point for someone on the FLOTUS team, jumpstarting the statement drafting. Of course, their boss’s post has more views than all of that list combined.
MM, WHATCHA SAY?
“Nobody’s ever seen anything like this” is a fitting exclamation for a novel phenomenon, say the successful (though brief) removal of a late-night talk show host after an organized social media takedown, elevated by threats from the FCC. Benny Johnson is making it his mission that we see something juuuust like it for a second time.
On September 17, 2025, Johnson said of Kimmel Takedown 1.0:
“Thanks to FCC pressure and Nexstar and Sinclair pulling him from millions of homes, his platform is destroyed. He’s finished. Will never recover.”
I guess his hindsight is 20/25 on that one. I wanted to measure my own so I went back and looked at the piece I wrote on the cancel consequence culture brought upon Kimmel after Charlie Kirk’s assassination. Benny Johnson’s mostly running the same social media playbook, but I’m gonna walk you through the big differences.
Same, same:
Like last time, he’s posted half a dozen YouTube videos on the topic within 36 hours, accounting for over a million views.
Like last time, he’s tweeting at length about it — 17 times in 48 hours
Like last time, he’s pronouncing Kimmel’s career over:
But different:
A new argument — he’s made this point across platforms (1, 2, 3) in the past day or so.
“Try going on Disney-owned ABC and saying that Michelle Obama deserves to be a widow. Or Jill Biden. Or Hillary Clinton. You’d not only have your show canceled, you’d be banned from network media for life.”
Now, here’s something I wrote about creators on the left in September about Kimmel Round One:
“The day was peppered with iterations of ‘could you imagine if ___ threatened/pushed/went after ___?’ [...] I tend to be wary of this mental exercise because the right isn’t governed by this same reciprocal thinking.”
I need like a fun sound effect that plays whenever I’m wrong about something. Seven months later, and we’ve discovered the right is governed by exactly the same reciprocal thinking. Where do we go as a culture when the only arguments we have against each other require hypothetical imagination? Can we move forward if the only deal anyone wants to make is “I’ll change my behavior if you change yours?”
(These are real questions I’d love you to answer)
Also keeping an eye on:
It’s hard to imagine Benny Johnson wouldn’t want to mimic the play-by-play that resulted in Kimmel’s yanking the first time. But so far there’s no word of an invite to FCC Chair Brendan Carr for another bombshell interview to get this party started.
In the very casually titled YT video he posted today — Jimmy Kimmel RESPONDS After Trump Assassination Joke BACKFIRE | Sets Internet on FIRE 🔥 — he took aim not at the left … but at “a faction of feckless cowards,” like Ben Shapiro and Ted Cruz, on his side for Kimmel’s removal not “sticking” the first time:
“They dangle a little bit of ‘look, leftwingers will praise you if you turn on Trump, if you turn on your own side, if you betray your own side. The left will praise you. They’ll pat you on the head, and they’ll embrace you.’ And that is always a false paradigm. They view all of us as blood libel — guilty of associating with Trump and his movement. And for every single one of us, it’s a camp waiting, if they get what they want. Or worse a coffin. And so, eternal shame on the Republicans and the commentators [...] who turned on us and didn’t use maximum force to get Jimmy Kimmel ripped off air forever and banished to whatever little channel he would start.”
SOFTWARE UPDATE NEEDED
This is the post I saw placed directly above Benny Johnson’s first “FIRE JIMMY KIMMEL” command over the Melania joke in my feed. Divine intervention.
STOLEN GOODS
I was writing up a section here about how the left’s response on social wasn’t sitting right with me either. Bookmarked posts from Harry Sisson and Sen. Adam Schiff both throwing around a bunch of “snowflake” labels hoping one will land. But I decided this wasn’t the right forum to go into it — that’s suited for Substack Live with Sawyer Hackett coming your way on Thursday. Keep your eyes peeled for a save the date tomorrow.
LOOSE ENDS
📰 Something you should read today: Rachel Reeves’ teenage daughter wrote an amazing piece on falling out of love with Brett Cooper as her content shifts. Genuinely so impressed.
“Everyone is always going to lose or gain something by calling things out. There is always that chance, especially in politics. You may have MORE to lose now, but you only gained that because of what and who you were in the very beginning: someone who was true to their principles and ideals. As it stands today, Brett has lost that for me. She’s just the same as the other talking heads and public puppets in the media.”
🕵️ Someone you should know today: I don’t know who runs the @Thiss_Youu Twitter account but holy shit it’s reaching its peak strength right now. God’s work.
🥹 Something to make you smile today: A rug I ordered from a random Etsy seller in Afghanistan just arrived after weeks of waiting. It is absolutely glorious. Bask in the splendor of one corner with me!
Once again, I stare into the middle distance and ask myself "Are we REALLY going to have nationally-important conversations over free speech and freedom of the press because people are mad at the guy from the fucking Man Show?"
Thanks for sharing my daughter’s article!