Jimmy Kimmel started the Dec. 2 episode of his ABC talk show by condemning Kanye West for praising Hitler during a horrific antisemitic tirade on Alex Jones’ “Infowars” talk show earlier that day. Kimmel called West a “Black white supremacist” and expressed shock over the fact that the controversial rapper still has a following. West told Jones that he likes Nazis and that every human brings value to the world, especially Hitler.
“Especially Hitler?!” Kimmel told viewers. “I think he’s wearing the wrong color hood.”
West claimed during his “Infowars” interview that Hitler cannot be considered all bad since he invented things like the microphone. Kimmel fired back, “Hitler didn’t invent highways or the microphone. Kanye seems to be the first person claiming Hitler invented the microphone. I think he might be referencing the old myth that Nazis invented the microwave oven… but that’s not a microphone.”
“I haven’t seen anything like this,” Kimmel continued. “We have a Black white supremacist running around… Let’s imagine this was another pop star. Imagine if it was Ariana Grande saying this stuff. We’d load her into a cannon and fire her into the ocean, right? But Kanye seems to get crazier every day and he still has fans. And you know an interview’s gone off the rails when you’re watching it thinking, ‘Gee, I hope Alex Jones can talk some sense into this guy.’”
West’s latest comments drew widespread scorn on social media. As actor Josh Gad wrote on Twitter, “It’s not what Kanye West says that scares me. It’s that he has 30 million followers who listen to his insanity on top of a cheerleader in the form of the current owner of this platform. No one who says ‘I love Hitler’ should be allowed any oxygen on any social platform (period).”
West’s antisemitic hate speech has resulted in Adidas ending its business relationship with him, CAA dropping him as a client and MRC scrapping a planned documentary about his career. West claimed in late October that he lost $2 billion in one day because of his hate speech. Even Elon Musk banned West from Twitter following the “Infowars” interview after West shared a photo of a Nazi swastika inside a Jewish star.
Watch Kimmel’s opening monologue in which he addresses West in the video below.