Roseanne Barr has accused ABC of treating her more harshly than late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, pointing to her 2018 firing compared with his recent five-day suspension.
In an interview with NewsNation on Tuesday, Barr said the network applied a “double standard” in allowing Kimmel to return quickly after ABC temporarily pulled “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” after comments he made during his Sept. 15 monologue.
“It just shows how they think,” Barr said. “I got my whole life ruined, no forgiveness, all of my work stolen, and called a racist for time and eternity, for racially misgendering someone. It’s a double standard.”
Barr’s sitcom was canceled in May 2018 after she posted a social media message comparing former Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, who is Black, to characters from “Planet of the Apes.” She deleted the post and apologized, but then-ABC president Channing Dungey called the remarks “abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values.”
Barr said Kimmel called her a racist at the time despite his own history of appearing in blackface sketches, including impersonations of NBA player Karl Malone on “The Man Show,” which aired on Comedy Central.
In 2020, Kimmel apologized for those appearances, saying in a statement to CNN: “There is nothing more important to me than your respect, and I apologize to those who were genuinely hurt or offended by the makeup I wore or the words I spoke.”
Kimmel faced backlash last week for his comments about the killing of conservative leader Charlie Kirk in Utah. During his monologue, he said: “We had some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them.”
ABC then suspended the program for five days before resuming broadcasts.
Barr argued that Kimmel’s lack of support during her controversy contributed to his current difficulties.
“If he had defended me, maybe this wouldn’t have happened,” she said.
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