White House Blasts 'Classless Hack' Jimmy Kimmel Over Donald Trump Oscars Jibes

Donald Trump’s spokesperson had a predictably thin-skinned response to Jimmy Kimmel’s jibes about him at the Oscars.

On Sunday night, Trump was alluded to several times over the course of the Academy Awards ceremony, most notably when Kimmel was on stage presenting awards to the year’s winning documentaries.

“As you know there are some countries whose leaders don’t support free speech,” the talk show host said. “I’m not at liberty to say which… let’s just leave it at North Korea and CBS.”

Later, he cryptically declared “oh, man is he gonna be mad his wife wasn’t nominated for this”, referencing Melania Trump’s much-panned documentary, which was released earlier this year.

Elsewhere, he remarked: “There are also documentaries where you walk around the White House trying on shoes.”

Before the Oscars ceremony was even over, White House director of communications Steven Cheung fired back at Kimmel on X.

Referring to Kimmel as “Mr Blackface” (a nod to the comic previously using Blackface to impersonate celebrities including Oprah Winfrey and Snoop Dogg, for which he apologised in 2020), Cheung said: “[Kimmel] is a classless hack who is self-projecting his depression and sadness onto others. He lives a pathetic existence where nobody – not even his family – enjoys his miserable company.

“The only people giving him any attention are Hollywood Elites. BUH-BYE!”

Kimmel, of course, has had his own brushes with Trump in the past.

Last year, the US broadcaster ABC announced that Kimmel was being taken off the air “indefinitely” following remarks he’d made days earlier about the fall-out from the killing of far-right political commentator Charlie Kirk.

During a comedy monologue, the comedian had observed: “We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterise this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”

After the news of Kimmel’s suspension broke, many called for a boycott of the streaming services Disney+ and Hulu (both of which are owned and operated by Disney, the parent company of ABC), with the company reported to have taken a hit of around $3 billion overnight.

Eventually, he returned to the air just days later, with Kimmel making light of the furore during his first show back.

Speaking to Variety after the Oscars, Kimmel said: “Am I exhausted? Yes, I’m exhausted! Of course! It’s ridiculous! We live in a ridiculous country.

“We always lived in a ridiculous country, but it was always ridiculous in a fun, Mr T kind of way. Now, we’ve got a different Mr T.”

“No, I’m not scared,” he added. “Am I hopeful? I’m always hopeful.”