CNN was feeling warm and fuzzy Monday afternoon in reacting to Disney’s decision to allow Jimmy Kimmel to return Tuesday night to his late-night ABC show, declaring it “a critical moment when it comes to free speech,” “a huge moment in American history,” and akin to The Avengers coming together with Hollywood, “the left,” and “Kimmel’s audience” forming to make an “unstoppable” force.

CNN News Central had chief media analyst Brian Stelter deliver the news:

Already on-set, former ABC correspondent Terry Moran gushed about this “great news”:

Moran injected more lunacy a few moments later by suggesting Kimmel’s show was somehow a constitutional right

All of this is bedrock First Amendment rights that we all have. And I think I think they’ve overreached here. Most Americans, even many, many who support President Trump, did not like the kind of gangster talk that the head of the FCC said, you can do this the easy way. You can do it the hard way. And they understand how precious this right is, even for people that they disagree strongly with. There’s good common sense about our first amendment rights. And I think Trump is running up against that.

Entertainment correspondent Elizabeth Wagmeister was giddy about her pals in Hollywood:

This led into second and third-worst set of hot takes from CNN’s early coverage (behind The Avengers reference), courtesy of co-host Brianna Keilar talking about this “moment” for “free speech” and co-host Boris Sanchez showing his detachment from reality about Kimmel’s return being so seminal for “American history”:

Wagmeister returned after the top of the hour for The Arena and predictedKimmel will double down (on his hateful rhetoric to half the country). She also bragged Disney chose to “anger many on the right” as opposed to “the entire Hollywood community” or “the left”:

But Wagmeister had nothing on fellow CNN entertainment reporter Lisa Respers France, who gushed that Kimmel created “a conversation about the First Amendment” and that he was saved by what “almost feels like The Avengers”:

This reminded us of this truly ludicrous moment in November 2020 when then-PBS correspondent Yamiche Alcindor compared Biden’s early Cabinet picks to a real-life version of The Avengers.

The liberal media still don’t get it and how much of the country has had enough of their decades of hate.

Somehow, they still emanated delight over Kimmel while also conceding his audience heavily skews to the left:

51 minutes since CNN first went live with the breaking news, they finally had conservative weigh in. Even better than that was former Congressman Pete Meijer (R-MI) making a point that lined up with our Alex Christy’s years of studies on late-night:

The coverage wound down with this head-scratcher:

To see the relevant CNN transcripts from September 22, click here (for CNN News Central) and here (for The Arena).