{"id":450990,"date":"2025-09-20T13:01:38","date_gmt":"2025-09-20T13:01:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/450990\/"},"modified":"2025-09-20T13:01:38","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T13:01:38","slug":"even-ted-cruz-calls-out-trumps-fcc-chair-over-jimmy-kimmel-firing-says-its-dangerous-as-hell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/450990\/","title":{"rendered":"Even TED CRUZ Calls Out TRUMP&#8217;S FCC CHAIR Over Jimmy Kimmel Firing \u2014 Says It&#8217;s &#8220;DANGEROUS AS HELL&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title = \"Even TED CRUZ Calls Out TRUMP&#039;S FCC CHAIR Over Jimmy Kimmel Firing \u2014 Says It&#039;s &quot;DANGEROUS AS HELL&quot;\"   width=\"580\" height=\"385\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ne2xuIoFPnE\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<br \/>\nEven TED CRUZ Calls Out TRUMP&#8217;S FCC CHAIR Over Jimmy Kimmel Firing \u2014 Says It&#8217;s &#8220;DANGEROUS AS HELL&#8221;<br \/>\n<br \/>\nEven TED CRUZ Calls Out TRUMP&#8217;S FCC CHAIR Over Jimmy Kimmel Firing \u2014 Says It&#8217;s &#8220;DANGEROUS AS HELL&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>\ud83c\udfa4 Ted Cruz Calls Out Trump\u2019s Assault on Free Speech<\/p>\n<p>For once, Ted Cruz (Republican &#8211; Texas) said the quiet part out loud. In one of the strongest GOP rebukes yet to President Donald Trump\u2019s FCC crackdown and the firing of Jimmy Kimmel, Cruz didn\u2019t mince words. He called it \u201cdangerous as hell,\u201d compared it to something \u201cright out of Goodfellas,\u201d and warned: \u201cThey will silence us. They will use this power, and they will use it ruthlessly.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udccc Let\u2019s be clear about what Cruz is responding to. The Trump administration, through its loyalists at the FCC, leaned on Sinclair Broadcasting as it pushes a $6.2 billion merger with Tegna that requires federal approval. The message from Trump\u2019s White House was unmistakable: silence critics like Jimmy Kimmel or risk losing the deal. And so, Kimmel \u2014 one of Trump\u2019s loudest critics in late-night TV \u2014 was out.<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udd25 Even Cruz sees the danger. This is not just about one comedian. If the president of the United States can weaponize regulatory power to silence entertainers, networks, or journalists, then no one\u2019s speech is safe. Today it\u2019s Jimmy Kimmel. Tomorrow it could be Stephen Colbert. Or a journalist at The Washington Post. Or even a conservative voice who dares to cross Trump. That\u2019s how authoritarianism works \u2014 not all at once, but by making examples until fear and silence take hold.<\/p>\n<p>\u26a0\ufe0f What makes Cruz\u2019s comments so striking is that he\u2019s hardly a defender of the left. Usually, he\u2019s one of Trump\u2019s most reliable allies in the Senate. But even he recognizes that when you start using government power to punish dissent, the principle applies to everyone. If Trump can silence comedians today, he can silence conservatives tomorrow. Cruz\u2019s blunt warning \u2014 \u201cThey will silence us\u2026 and they will use it ruthlessly\u201d \u2014 shows just how reckless this administration\u2019s assault on free speech has become.<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udce3 Democrats in Congress are pushing back hard. They\u2019re demanding investigations into whether Trump\u2019s FCC conditioned the Sinclair\u2013Tegna merger on political loyalty. They\u2019re calling this the most brazen assault on free speech in modern American history. And they\u2019re warning that Republicans who stay silent are complicit. Because when presidents can decide who gets to broadcast and who doesn\u2019t, it\u2019s no longer a democracy. It\u2019s censorship by executive fiat.<\/p>\n<p>\ud83c\udfad Comedians across the country are rallying behind Kimmel too. Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, John Oliver \u2014 they all understand the stakes. Comedy has always been a safety valve for democracy, a way to speak truth to power. If that freedom is stripped away because one president can\u2019t handle a joke, then every American loses something fundamental. Free expression isn\u2019t about protecting comfortable speech. It\u2019s about protecting the uncomfortable, the challenging, the critical. That\u2019s what Trump is trying to erase.<\/p>\n<p>\ud83c\udf0e History reminds us how dangerous this is. Richard Nixon once tried to weaponize the FCC against networks that covered Watergate too aggressively. It was wrong then, and it\u2019s wrong now. Around the world, authoritarians from Putin to Orb\u00e1n have consolidated power by silencing the media first. When the press and comedians are forced into silence, the people are left with propaganda \u2014 and democracy withers.<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udca5 Bottom line: when even Ted Cruz \u2014 one of Trump\u2019s most loyal Republicans \u2014 warns that this is \u201cdangerous as hell,\u201d Americans need to listen. This isn\u2019t about celebrity drama or TV ratings. It\u2019s about whether the United States will continue to have a free press and the right to criticize those in power without fear of government retaliation. Trump\u2019s FCC intimidation is reckless, authoritarian, and profoundly un-American. Democrats, comedians, and yes, even a few Republicans like Cruz are right: if we don\u2019t fight back now, the freedom to speak out could be lost for good.<\/p>\n<p>#politics #news #congress #politicalnews #usa #america #trump #donaldtrump #media  #newsheadlines #tv  #newsupdate #fyp #foryou #breakingnews<br \/>\n<br \/>\nAll right. It&#8217;s rare when I agree with Ted Cruz, but even Ted Cruz sees how insane firing Jimmy Kimmel is. And for Trump&#8217;s FCC to force critics off the air, Ted Cruz has come out with the strongest Republican statement yet about what FCC chair Brendan Carr did to Jimmy Kimmel. Ted Cruz calls it dangerous as hell. He calls it right out of Good Fellas. He says Democrats will silence us and they will use this power that Trump is using and they will use it ruthlessly against us when we take power back. So again, Cancun Ted Cruz who I find majority if not almost all of his views to be repugnant and abhorrent. I find his behavior to be unacceptable for any human being let alone a member of Congress. But he&#8217;s right. And why won&#8217;t more Republicans stand up and say what he&#8217;s saying, which is that President Trump is using the government straight out of good fellas like a boss of a crime family to intimidate people who are going to talk about him and say, &#8220;You can&#8217;t talk about me. I&#8217;m going to pull your license.&#8221; Freedom of the press and freedom of speech are two of the most sacred freedoms we have. They&#8217;re in the First Amendment for a reason. And many of these Republicans who sit silent while President Trump pulls pulls critics off the air, they&#8217;re not going to like it when President Gavin Newsome does the same thing to Fox News and Newsmax here. Freedom of the press means being able to be critical of the president. It means being able to speak recklessly. That is your birthright by living in America and being an American citizen. So, I can&#8217;t believe I&#8217;m saying it, but hats off to Ted Cruz. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Even TED CRUZ Calls Out TRUMP&#8217;S FCC CHAIR Over Jimmy Kimmel Firing \u2014 Says It&#8217;s &#8220;DANGEROUS AS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":450991,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26129],"tags":[71833,183765,162942,11053,73418,192435,242090,242091,18070,242092,63006,180012,178623,37140,162939,71832,731,202157],"class_list":{"0":"post-450990","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-drama","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-congress","10":"tag-donald-trump","11":"tag-drama","12":"tag-election","13":"tag-government","14":"tag-josh-lafazan","15":"tag-josh-lafazan-show","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-news-headlines","18":"tag-news-today","19":"tag-news-update","20":"tag-political-news","21":"tag-politics","22":"tag-trump","23":"tag-usa","24":"tag-731","25":"tag-202157"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450990","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450990"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450990\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450990"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450990"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450990"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}