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Jimmy Kimmel Calls Off Truce With Ted Cruz

Although Kimmel had previously thanked the MAGA senator for defending him, that didn’t mean he was off-limits.

Jimmy Kimmel is back to making fun of Ted Cruz.

The Texas senator accidentally urged people to “stop attacking pedophiles” during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday.

Kimmel showed a clip of Cruz making the awkward slip-up. “How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop murders’? How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop rape’? How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop attacking pedophiles’?”

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“I was with you on the first two,” Kimmel replied.

Referencing the Jeffrey Epstein files, which Cruz had voted against releasing to the public, Kimmel jokingly agreed with Cruz’s third point, saying, “That’s right: some of the president’s best dead friends are pedophiles!”

Kimmel added, “And then Ted caught the next flight to Cancun,” referencing Cruz’s 2021 vacation to Cancun during a historic cold snap ravaging his home state.

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Kimmel’s Wednesday monologue marks his first time roasting Cruz since Jimmy Kimmel Live! was briefly pulled from air in mid-September.

Kimmel’s show was preempted due to an apparent threat against ABC from the Trump-appointed FCC chairman, Brendan Carr. Although many in MAGA world celebrated the news, Cruz criticized Carr and defended Kimmel’s right to keep making his show.

“What [Carr] said there is dangerous as hell,“ Cruz argued. ”That’s right out of Goodfellas."

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It was perhaps inevitable that Kimmel would return to making fun of Cruz, but he did thank the senator in his first episode back.

“I don’t think I’ve ever said this before, but Ted Cruz is right‚” Kimmel had said, after playing a clip of Cruz’s comments criticizing Carr. Kimmel also gave a shoutout to right-wing pundits like Ben Shapiro and Candace Owens for defending his show.

“Even though I don’t agree with many of those people on most subjects, and some of the things they say even make me want to throw up, it takes courage for them to speak out against this administration, and they did, and they deserve credit for it,“ Kimmel said.

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