Jimmy Kimmel’s Wife Says She Tried to Stop Him from Reading Donald Trump’s Comments at 2024 Oscars: ‘I Was Totally Off’

Jimmy Kimmel defied his wife Molly McNearney and delivered one of the funniest moments at the 2024 Academy Awards on Sunday night!

Kimmel, 56, explained in an interview with Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos that aired Monday that toward the end of the night, producers told him he had time to kill and someone showed him former President Donald Trump’s post on Truth Social about his hosting skills.

Jimmy Kimmel reads Donald Trump’s announcement from his phone on stage at the 2024 Academy Awards.

Kevin Winter/Getty

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In the post, Trump, 77, called Kimmel’s opening monologue “less than average” and said he was “trying too hard.” He also called the show “boring.”

Kimmel told Ripa, 53, and Consuelos, 52, that someone tried to stop him, but he didn’t tell them it was his wife.

The Boss Baby The actor took the stage, read a lengthy announcement and ended his speech with a question that caused the room to erupt in laughter. “I’m surprised you’re still around [up] “Isn’t your prison time over?” he asked.

In an interview with Diversity McNearney, who was co-executive producer of the awards telecast, revealed that she was a skeptical party.

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“I’ll tell you, I’m really not proud of this, but I tried to talk Jimmy out of reading it,” she said. “I feel like my instincts are usually right, but I was dead wrong.”

McNearney, 46, explained that she’s not in favor of giving Trump airtime if he doesn’t have to. She admitted that she thought the joke was a “risk” too.

Donald Trump.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty

“I just wanted to make sure it ended well and I didn’t want it to end badly,” McNearney explained.

Kimmel assured his wife that everything would be fine. “He had a gleam in his eye, and he said, ‘I got this.’ It really is. Here he shines,” she said.

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The joke was a hit and McNearney knew Kimmel would read the post, but that doesn’t mean the problem is solved in the Kimmel-McNearney household.

“I’ll tell you, I’ll never win an argument in my household again!” McNearney joked.

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Source: HIS Education