Jimmy Kimmel turned to YouTube on Thursday night to house his interview with Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico — in light of fears that the FCC would punish ABC stations for running the chat.
“What are they so scared of you?” Kimmel asked the candidate. Said Talarico: “Well, they’re worried that we’re going to win this race in Texas. But we are the underdogs until the last vote is counted. We’re not just going up against the most corrupt politician in Texas. We’re going up against this entire corrupt system.”
“Scripture tells us that you can’t love God and hate other people,” Talarico said. “You can’t love God and abuse the immigrant. You can’t love God and oppress the poor. You can’t love God and bully the outcast … I was brought up to believe that in the face of a neighbor, we glimpse the face of God. Matthew 25 tells us Christians exactly how we’re going to be judged and how we’re going to be saved by feeding the hungry, by healing the sick, by welcoming the stranger.
“I often wonder what would Jesus do if he visited the U.S. Senate. I think he would tell the senators on the floor, ‘Depart from me, for I was hungry and you cut my food assistance. I was sick and you kicked me off Medicaid. I was a stranger and you deported me and my family.’ And then I think he would flip over those fancy desks on the floor of the U.S. Senate and demand that we take care of all of our neighbors, especially the least of these.”
He expanded on the reason in his Thursday monologue: “I mentioned last night, this interview will not be televised because of threats from the FCC, led by Commissioner Brendan Carr, who says we do not have the right to interview whichever candidates we want to interview. Which is something we’ve been doing for twenty-plus years.
Ultimately, Colbert put his Talarico interview on YouTube, with the clip garnering 9.5 million views. The Talarico campaign raised $2.5 million in the 24 hours after Colbert revealed he was barred from airing the interview.
Here’s Kimmel’s interview with Talarico, posted Thursday night on YouTube:
