Jimmy Kimmel returned to ABC this week. Sort of. About a quarter of ABC’s usual audience couldn’t see the talk show host this week after two major owners of ABC affiliates, Sinclair and Nexstar, refused to carry the show. Those right-leaning companies apparently felt that Kimmel’s joke—which included some disputed facts—was so unpardonable that they couldn’t expose their viewers to the comedian. They were also the first organizations to pull the plug on Kimmel, after Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr seemed to threaten action. That means that even the stations that did carry the show—as well as Disney, which owns ABC—might be courting the ire of a government official who seems eager to use his powers to silence critics.

Carr does have power. The FCC can grant and revok

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