NYC mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani will not be participating in a Town Hall event with WABC this week due to the parent company’s decision to suspend Jimmy Kimmel‘s late-night show.
“We cannot understand this moment of authoritarianism as solely coming from the White House, when it is also characterized by the cowardice of those in response to it — the cowardice that we have seen typified whether by the parent company of ABC or by so-called leaders like Andrew Cuomo and Eric Adams looking to the White House for their path to their future ambition. I am running to be the next mayor of the city to finally make clear what it looks like to stand up, not just for this city, but also for the Constitution,” Mamdani said at an event in New York Monday.
Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for New York City major, was meant to participate in the town hall with the ABC News affiliate on Sept. 25. He announced his withdrawal at Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms State Park on Roosevelt Island, while citing that he was withdrawing in response to the “corporate leaders who have put their bottom line ahead of their responsibility in upholding the freedom of the press.”
His statements came after Jimmy Kimmel Live! was suspended last Wednesday after Kimmel made some comments about the alleged murderer of Charlie Kirk. Disney made the ultimate decision to suspend Kimmel, after his show had been pre-empted by Nexstar, one of the biggest owners of local TV stations in the country and after FCC chair Brendan Carr had appear to threaten Kimmell and ABC affiliate licenses over Kimmel’s comments.
“We have to understand who suffers in these moments. It’s not just a question of Jimmy Kimmel himself, it’s also a question of the engineers, the writers, the musicians who are feeling this attack on the very city they call home. The message that it sends to each and every American across this country is a message that the First Amendment is no longer a right that can be counted on, but rather that it is the government which will determine what should and should not be discussed, what can and cannot be spoken,” Mamdani added.