Jimmy Kimmel would like to clarify he has no "psychic abilities" after one of his recent jokes took on a new meaning.
On his late-night show, the comedian responded to backlash over a joke he made about Rudy Giuliani, days before it was reported that the former New York City mayor was hospitalized in "critical but stable condition."
During his April 28 monologue, Kimmel joked that Giuliani "rose from the grave" before the comedian played a clip of the politician. Less than a week later, a spokesperson confirmed on May 3 that Giuliani had been hospitalized. Some of Kimmel's critics brought the joke back up amid Giuliani's hospitalization, with conservative commentator Benny Johnson posting it on X and asking, "Why is Kimmel always joking about death?"
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Kimmel addressed the resurfaced comments in his May 4 monologue.
"When I read this [about Giuliani], I really thought, 'I wonder if they'll try to blame this on me,'" he said. "And then sure enough, one of these podcast bozos points to a joke I made about Rudy on Thursday, about him being a vampire, and then suggests I might actually have some inside knowledge of what's going on in Trumptown there, and then that becomes a thing."
Kimmel went on to sarcastically joke about his supposed "psychic abilities," quipping, "Every day in the morning, I wake up, I make coffee, and then I look into the future to see which events have yet to occur, and then we write jokes that we know are going to make trouble."
On a more serious note, Kimmel said he hopes Giuliani "lives another 100 years." The former mayor is recovering from pneumonia, his spokesperson said on May 4.
The resurfaced Giuliani joke came after President Donald Trump called for the late-night host to be fired for jokingly calling first lady Melania Trump an "expectant widow" on his show on April 23. Kimmel made the comment two days before the White House Correspondents' Association dinner, where a suspect was arrested and charged with attempting to assassinate Trump.
After the dinner, Kimmel's "expectant widow" comment resurfaced, and Trump accused him of making a "despicable call to violence" against him.
Kimmel defended the comment as a "very light roast joke about the fact that he's almost 80 and she's younger than I am," adding, "It was not, by any stretch of the definition, a call to assassination, and they know that." Trump, though, did not let up, posting on Truth Social on April 30 that ABC "better" fire Kimmel "soon." There has been no indication that the Disney-owned network intends to do so.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Jimmy Kimmel addresses backlash to resurfaced Giuliani joke
