According to The Hollywood Reporter, on Thursday, Jimmy Kimmel (The Man Show, Crank Yankers) hosted his potentially final show of the year for Jimmy Kimmel Live! and he took a moment to thank his viewers for helping with what was a hard year. The ABC late-night host started his monologue with tears in his eyes, reflecting on what he acknowledged was a difficult year.

“This has been a strange year. It’s been a hard year,” Kimmel said via The Hollywood Reporter. “We’ve had some lows. We’ve had some highs. For me, maybe more than any year of my life.”

As per The Hollywood Reporter, for the host nd the show, 2025 was an eventful year. During the year, Kimmel was suspended by ABC’s parent company Disney, targeted by the president of the United States, and grappling with the unexpected untimely death of his show’s bandleader and his longtime friend, Cleto Escobedo (Made, Demon Star).

“On behalf of all of us at the show, I just want to say that we appreciate your support, your enthusiasm, and not just for watching this year, you literally pulled us out of a hole, and we cannot thank you enough,” Kimmel told the audience via The Hollywood Reporter. “I know there are a lot harder jobs, but this is not an easy job to do, and sometimes it feels like we’re spinning our wheels. You see so many awful and destructive acts, all this damage we inflict on ourselves on purpose, and it can make you feel crazy trying to wrap your head around these things that are so clearly wrong.”

“I watched a show, co-workers, friends and the man I love be put on ‘indefinite suspension’ after our thin-skinned president asked for his removal and his FCC chair publicly threatened the company we work for. It is a fragile time for freedom,” Molly McNearney (Dumplin’, Fun Mom Dinner) said at The Hollywood Reporter’s Women in Entertainment brunch.

The Hollywood Reporter, the show eventually returned and gave Kimmel a new deal that will keep him on board as host until at least May of 2027.

“You know, you grew up reading Superman, and you learn to value truth, justice and the American way, and then you start to realize, especially over the last year, you don’t know where that all went. You don’t know what the American way even is anymore,” Kimmel said via The Hollywood Reporter. “But when I hear from people who tell me that they watch our show and the shows that my friends and colleagues do on the other channels, and that it makes them feel less crazy. It makes me feel less crazy too, and I think that’s an important thing.

“I also think it’s important that we as Americans let our friends in other countries who watch the show on YouTube, on Instagram, Hulu, wherever, know that a lot of us are not OK with what is happening,” he continued via The Hollywood Reporter. “There is still much more good in this country than bad, and we hope that you will bear with us during this extended psychotic episode that we’re in the middle of.”

The full monologue by Kimmel is down below.