With the exception of NBC’s The Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon, all of the late night comedy reacted to the assassination of Charlie Kirk on their Thursday program by hitting on all the proper points about political violence being unacceptable and un-American. Some even criticized some on the left for their reaction to it, but while some may sincerely believe that gun control is part of the solution, they nevertheless lack the factual evidence to support such claims.
ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel, probably referring to the responses to his Bluesky post, lamented, “I’ve seen a lot of extraordinarily vile responses to this from both sides of the political spectrum. Some people are cheering this, which is something I just won't ever understand.”
Kimmel then turned to guns, “We had another school shooting yesterday in Colorado. The 100th one of the year.”
That stat appears to be from Everytown, but they report “100 incidents of gunfire on school grounds,” not school shootings like the one in Colorado that Kimmel cited.
Kimmel then decried that, “with all of these terrible things happening, you would think that our president would at least try to bring us together, but he didn't. President Obama did, President Biden did, Presidents Bush and Clinton did. President Trump did not. Instead, he blamed Democrats for their rhetoric.”
He then went on to cite some examples of rhetoric from Trump that he found particularly harmful.
Meanwhile, on Comedy Central, The Daily Show’s host-of-the-week Michael Kosta reacted to clips of GOP Rep. Nancy Mace and Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren each demanding the other side lower their rhetoric, “Right, so, here we go again, ‘It's Democrats' rhetoric,’ ‘No, it's Republicans' rhetoric.’ Has anyone considered that the problem of political violence in America might not just be the rhetoric, but instead something extraordinarily complex? The problem might be a toxic mix of our gun laws, lack of mental health, collapsed social connection, probably a bunch of other things that I haven't even thought of yet.”
Shifting to cable news, Kosta continued mourning, “Political violence isn't going to go away if the people on the other side say exactly the right words from now on. That said, if you turned on the 24/7 news coverage yesterday, you probably saw some unhelpful rhetoric.”
Politics is, always has been, and always will be contentious, and while Kosta makes a fair point about demanding people use “exactly the right words,” we should be able to say that the portion of the far-left that thinks speech they don’t like is violence needs to be rebuked.
Over at NBC, Late Night host Seth Meyers correctly declared political violence to be un-American, “Political violence is abhorrent and an anathema to the highest ideals of this country. It corrodes us and threatens the very foundations of our democracy. The great promise of our democratic experiment is that we can engage with one another and resolve our differences through dialogue, not violence. We must hold true to that promise and strive toward it with our fullest effort, even when it feels furthest away.”
Meyers then shifted to guns but had a different set of data than Kimmel, “I would be remiss if I did not also mention that several students were shot and injured in a school in Colorado yesterday, just two weeks after a horrific school shooting in Minnesota that killed two children and injured 21 more. There have already been over 300 mass shootings and 47 school shootings this year alone. We've said this many times on this program, and we'll say it again, gun violence is a plague in this country.”
He added, “We desperately need reasonable gun safety laws to stop this epidemic of tragedy and pain. No matter the identity or ideology of these perpetrators, one thing is always constant: the guns. We must make it possible for children to go to school and for everyone to engage in public debate without the threat of gun violence looming over them.”
The assassin reportedly used a bolt action rifle, the type of hunting rifle that even Democrats say they have no interest in banning.
Over at CBS, The Late Show’s Stephen Colbert was the only host to address Kirk’s murder for the second night in a row:
The country is still shocked and horrified by yesterday's assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. However you feel about his politics, he was a young father of two small children and an American who has the constitutional right to express his opinion in safety. It should go without saying that violence is never the answer to political disagreement. But I think these days it should be said as often as possible. And in such troubling moments, I'm grateful to any leader who, instead of dividing us, points to our common humanity. Yesterday, Speaker Mike Johnson made a call to bring the temperature down.
After a clip of Johnson, Colbert quipped, “We should be able to settle our disagreements civilly. In the end, as Americans, we're all brothers and sisters. Or at least Mike Johnson and I look like we are.”
Hosting a comedy show after an evil act can be extremely difficult. For the most part, the comedians passed the basic decency test. They had some questionable gun control claims, but those can be argued against with facts and evidence, and that is how it should be.
Here is a transcript for the September 11-taped shows:
ABC Jimmy Kimmel Live!
9/11/2025
11:36 PM ET
JIMMY KIMMEL: I’ve seen a lot of extraordinarily vile responses to this from both sides of the political spectrum. Some people are cheering this, which is something I just won't ever understand. We had another school shooting yesterday in Colorado. The 100th one of the year. And with all of these terrible things happening, you would think that our president would at least try to bring us together, but he didn't.
President Obama did, President Biden did, Presidents Bush and Clinton did. President Trump did not. Instead, he blamed Democrats for their rhetoric. The man who told a crowd of supporters that maybe "The Second Amendment people" should do something about Hillary Clinton. The man who said he wouldn't mind if someone shot through the fake news media. The man who unleashed a mob on the capitol and said Liz Cheney should "Face nine barrels shooting at her" for supporting his opponent blames the radical left for their rhetoric.
***
Comedy Central The Daily Show
9/11/2025
11:04 PM ET
MICHAEL KOSTA: Right, so, here we go again, “It's Democrats' rhetoric,” “No, it's Republicans' rhetoric." Has anyone considered that the problem of political violence in America might not just be the rhetoric, but instead something extraordinarily complex? The problem might be a toxic mix of our gun laws, lack of mental health, collapsed social connection, probably a bunch of other things that I haven't even thought of yet. I'm sure Labubus are somewhere in there to blame. I guess I just don't think rhetoric is the root cause of this thing. Political violence isn't going to go away if the people on the other side say exactly the right words from now on. That said, if you turned on the 24/7 news coverage yesterday, you probably saw some unhelpful rhetoric.
***
NBC Late Night with Seth Meyers
9/12/2025
12:38 AM ET
SETH MEYERS: Political violence is abhorrent and an anathema to the highest ideals of this country. It corrodes us and threatens the very foundations of our democracy. The great promise of our democratic experiment is that we can engage with one another and resolve our differences through dialogue, not violence. We must hold true to that promise and strive toward it with our fullest effort, even when it feels furthest away. I would be remiss if I did not also mention that several students were shot and injured in a school in Colorado yesterday, just two weeks after a horrific school shooting in Minnesota that killed two children and injured 21 more.
There have already been over 300 mass shootings and 47 school shootings this year alone. We've said this many times on this program, and we'll say it again, gun violence is a plague in this country. We desperately need reasonable gun safety laws to stop this epidemic of tragedy and pain. No matter the identity or ideology of these perpetrators, one thing is always constant: the guns. We must make it possible for children to go to school and for everyone to engage in public debate without the threat of gun violence looming over them.
***
CBS The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
9/11/2025
11:37 PM ET
STEPHEN COLBERT: The country is still shocked and horrified by yesterday's assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. However you feel about his politics, he was a young father of two small children and an American who has the constitutional right to express his opinion in safety. It should go without saying that violence is never the answer to political disagreement. But I think these days it should be said as often as possible. And in such troubling moments, I'm grateful to any leader who, instead of dividing us, points to our common humanity. Yesterday, Speaker Mike Johnson made a call to bring the temperature down.
MIKE JOHNSON: We need everyone who has a platform to say this loudly and clearly. We can settle disagreements and disputes in a civil manner, and political violence must be called out, and it has to stop. [jump cut] Political violence has become all too common in American society, and this is not who we are.
COLBERT: I agree with that sentiment. We should be able to settle our disagreements civilly. In the end, as Americans, we're all brothers and sisters. Or at least Mike Johnson and I look like we are.