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TikTok Algorithm to be Overseen by Oracle in the U.S.; Disney: Kimmel Show Will Return to Air Tomorrow Night. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired September 22, 2025 - 15:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[15:30:00]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: The White House just confirmed that TikTok's algorithm will be operated in the United States and overseen by Oracle after the sale is complete.

CNN Tech reporter Clare Duffy joins us now live. So Clare, what does this do to some of the security concerns surrounding TikTok?

CLARE DUFFY, CNN TECH REPORTER: Yes, Boris, what happens with the TikTok algorithm had been one of the major remaining questions surrounding this deal because the algorithm is of course part of the reason why TikTok is so popular. But it also had been at the root of some of these national security concerns with U.S. officials worrying that China-based ByteDance could be forced by the Chinese government to manipulate the algorithm to influence Americans.

So if this deal goes through, ByteDance will be providing a copy of the algorithm to this new majority American-owned joint venture in the United States. That group will then review the algorithm, retrain it on American users' data, and then the tech company Oracle will be continuously monitoring how the algorithm is serving up content to American users.

Now, a White House official tells us that that investor group that will be creating this new ownership group is not yet finalized, but we do expect it to include Oracle as well as the private equity firm Silver Lake. And President Donald Trump said over the weekend that tech CEO Michael Dell as well as Lachlan and Rupert Murdoch could be involved in that group as well. We do hear from a source that it will actually be Fox Corp rather than the Murdochs individually who is likely to invest in that group.

But stepping back a bit, I do think it's going to be interesting to see how TikTok users in the U.S. respond to this. Certainly we expect that people will be happy to hear that their access to the app is expected to be preserved long term with this deal, but I think it's going to be interesting to watch the response to this new ownership group, which is expected to include at least some Trump allies controlling what they can see on the platform, Boris. So that's something that I certainly will be watching closely as this deal moves forward.

SANCHEZ: Yes, an interesting point. Clare Duffy, thanks so much for the reporting. So the hosts of The View finally go there. They're addressing the

suspension of their colleague Jimmy Kimmel.

[15:35:00]

And while they didn't directly slam ABC or their parent company Disney for benching him, they did criticize what they call the Trump administration's attacks on the First Amendment.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Former ABC News senior national correspondent Terry Moran is with us now. He is the publisher of a Substack called Real Patriotism with Terry Moran, and he hosts a podcast on YouTube by the same name.

All right, Terry, I wonder what did you think about what you heard from The View hosts?

TERRY MORAN, FORMER CO-ANCHOR, ABC NEWS' NIGHTLINE: Well, I think that they needed to come out and say something because they talk about everything, right? And this was one of the biggest talkers of last week. They're careful, first to give Jimmy Kimmel the latitude he needs to say what he wants and do what he wants, and also there are indications that maybe he comes back on the air.

On the other hand, they did want to make clear that the Trump administration is on a campaign against speech that they don't -- that the people in the Trump administration don't like, and The View wanted to stand up against that, which makes good sense. What they weren't able to do is take the next step, which is that every single time the corporations are knuckling under.

SANCHEZ: I wonder what you make of actor Bradley Whitford, who I interviewed last hour, Emmy Award winner from West Wing and Handmaid's Tale. He talked about growing up in the 1950s and witnessing blacklisting at the time during the Red Scare, the Joe McCarthy era. He specifically said that it ultimately fell to the studio heads and the media moguls, those who held real power, to not buckle under pressure from the federal government.

Do you think that fits in the context of what Bob Iger is now considering?

MORAN: Well, I think so, and I think that that is one of the many chapters in our country's history where there has been pressure brought on speech, and it was up to individuals. During the Watergate -- during the 1970s, the Pentagon Papers, Katharine Graham, the publisher of the Washington Post, was threatened by Nixon's people that the FCC would take their broadcast licenses.

KEILAR: Terry, I'm so sorry to interrupt you. We have some breaking news that I actually want to get your reaction to after we get it here. Brian Stelter, this is about Jimmy Kimmel. What can you tell us?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST (via phone): Disney is bringing him back on the air tomorrow. ABC says in a statement that we made the decision last week to suspend production to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment. But now, after having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, the ABC says we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.

But Kimmel's getting back to work.

SANCHEZ: Wow, Brian, that is significant, especially given that some of the players outside of Disney, in a corporate setting like Nexstar and Sinclair, they essentially have deals that allowed them to preempt his show, and that's part of the reason that it was suspended. Do we know how they might react to this?

STELTER: We don't, and that becomes the big question now. Will these local station affiliates choose to air Jimmy Kimmel Live, or will they continue to protest the comedian, even though the network is bringing him back nationwide? ABC does gently chastise Kimmel in this statement.

The statement says, quote, the decision to suspend him. We made it because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive. So they're very gently saying they disagreed with Kimmel last week, but obviously they're bringing him back as of tomorrow.

KEILAR: And we don't know, obviously, all of the considerations that went into this, Brian. But I would say leaders, obviously, at ABC and Disney have had the benefit of a few days of feedback.

STELTER: Yes, including from Disney employees who were very disturbed, including from Hollywood stars and showrunners, the kind of people Disney wants to work with, and from free speech groups, politicians, even some Republican politicians like Ted Cruz. We know the condemnation of Disney has been widespread. Now, what we don't know yet is what the counter reaction will be from President Trump and his allies.

SANCHEZ: That's a really good point. Brian, please stand by. Terry, your reaction to this news.

MORAN: It's great news. It's great news. And I think you're absolutely right. And Brian is absolutely right. This was a community standing up for the rights of Jimmy Kimmel and all people who speak in public, entertainers and journalists and all of them. And it worked at least with the head of Disney.

And it makes good sense because they would have won in court. One thing that gets lost in this, you do not lose your First Amendment rights because you have a broadcast license. Supreme Court has been clear on this. The government cannot take your license because of speech they don't like.

KEILAR: You were talking about Katharine Graham when the news broke. And these are the considerations of these bigger companies about how they're going to handle this and how they're going to think about it. They do have the benefit of some history as they do consider these moves.

MORAN: Right. Well, Katharine Graham, when Nixon threatened to take her FCC -- the Washington Post FCC licenses, they had some local stations. It was a main source of income.

She published them anyway. She said, forget about it.

[15:40:00]

And that kind of corporate courage is rare, especially in the face of an administration that exceeds by many orders of magnitude any other presidency trying to silence speech it doesn't like.

SANCHEZ: If we still have Brian, I want to go back to him because one of the interesting bits of reporting that we got over the last few days was that Kimmel was actually preparing a monologue that would up the ante against some of the feedback that he got from the Trump administration. I mean, can you imagine, Brian, what might be formulating in terms of a response when he gets back on the air?

STELTER: All right, Kimmel wanted to defend himself. So now, Tuesday night's monologue becomes even more interesting. What he will be critical, and it might affect what local stations decide to do going forward.

KEILAR: Yes, certainly will. The -- I want to know what you think, Terry, about just sort of the moment that we are in when it comes to free speech. And I also want to play a moment from the White House press briefing today. This was a correspondent for Turning Point USA Frontline, associated with the group that Charlie Kirk founded, who asked the White House press secretary what her message is to Americans who are too afraid to express their beliefs. Here's a brief part of what Karoline Leavitt said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: We have a right to free speech in this country. The president supports it. It is protected by our beautiful Constitution, and Americans should not cower in fear. They should rise up in courage to continue speaking the truth.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: What do you think about what you're hearing from the White House there, as we just get this news that Jimmy Kimmel will return to air tomorrow night?

MORAN: Right. Well, see what the White House says. Everybody should speak up, except the ones that the president doesn't like.

He just barked at my former colleague, Jonathan Karl. Maybe we'll come after you because I don't like the content of your news coverage. All of this is bedrock First Amendment rights that we all have.

And I think I think they've overreached here. Most Americans, even many, many who support President Trump, did not like the kind of gangster talk that the head of the FCC said, you know, you can do this the easy way, you can do it the hard way. And they understand how precious this right is, even for people that they disagree strongly with. There's good common sense about our First Amendment rights, and I think Trump is running up against that.

KEILAR: Yes, Senator Ted Cruz said it was out of goodfellas, to your point there. Terry, thank you so much for being with us. Really appreciate it.

And this is the breaking news just in from Disney. Jimmy Kimmel, his show will return to air tomorrow night. Big news there as a lot of conservatives who had been very pleased that his show was yanked off the air indefinitely initially. We're characterizing it as a firing, but his show will return tomorrow night.

And we'll be right back with more news.

[15:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: Back to our breaking news. After being suspended and taken off the air, Jimmy Kimmel is returning to the air tomorrow night.

KEILAR: Let's go to Elizabeth Wagmeister now for more on this. Elizabeth, what are you learning?

ELIZABETH WAGMEISTER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT (via phone): You know, this may come as a big surprise to many people, but what I have been reporting all along is that Disney was very, very hopeful to bring back Jimmy Kimmel and that this was in no way a cancellation, or this was in no way him being fired, as some politicians have suggested.

When they took him off the air last week on Wednesday, as I have heard from my sources all along, this was because they wanted to diffuse the situation that Jimmy Kimmel wanted to come on air on Wednesday night last week with a monologue that I was told took aim at MAGA and that Disney felt would not have helped the situation. And if you look at Disney's statement, they actually do refer to that a bit.

They say, quote, last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country. It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill timed and thus insensitive. We've spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy. And after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.

So that is the statement on behalf of the Walt Disney Company that I received. And you see there that they are condemning some of the statements that he made. They are addressing that they understand that this is a tense time in the country.

But what I have been told from my sources is that the situation between Kimmel and Disney never got overly tense, that it was actually quite cordial and not from day one, that they always wanted to figure out a path to be able to bring the show back. And now they are doing that tomorrow night. Jimmy Kimmel Live will be back on the air.

SANCHEZ: And Elizabeth, it's still an open question whether some of the broadcast stations that initially threatened to preempt his show will be carrying it. Do we have any reaction so far from Nexstar and Sinclair?

WAGMEISTER: We do not yet. This, you know, statement from the Walt Disney Company coming in the last 30 minutes. So we do not know if they are going to carry the show tomorrow night later in this week.

But what we do know, based on Disney, is that they are airing the show regardless.

[15:50:00]

So even if Jimmy's show is being aired in less stations than it typically is, all of the country may not be able to see his show tomorrow night when he returns. But they are still committed to airing this show.

So Disney now, yes, condemning some of the statements that Jimmy made. Yes, acknowledging that much of the country was perhaps offended by the statements that he made, but also really standing by Jimmy.

And I do want to note that we have seen protests all throughout Hollywood, both in Los Angeles and in New York at Disney's offices here in Hollywood, where Jimmy Kimmel Live shoots his show. Today there was a protest. So the Hollywood community has very much been standing with Jimmy.

They have wanted him to come back. And just a few hours ago, I reported on 400 celebrities, including everyone from Meryl Streep to Jennifer Aniston, who signed an open letter from the ACLU. Not attacking Disney in any way, not even addressing Disney or ABC, but attacking any censorship and any silencing from the government, saying that this is a moment that is bigger than our industry. Once you silence an entertainer, once you silence a journalist, then you silence everyone, and it will be a snowball effect.

So you have to imagine that what went into Disney's decision was also, quite frankly, the creative partners that they have to work with. If you have the entire Hollywood community who is rallying behind Jimmy, well, that is something that they had to consider.

But again, I go back to what my sources have told me from the first moment that his show was preempted from the air, which is this was never a cancellation. They always wanted to find a path forward. They just knew that they had to take the temperature down in a moment where they had very real threats from station groups and also very real threat from the president of the United States.

KEILAR: And Brian Stelter still with us here. It'll be really interesting to see so much we don't know here, Brian, which is what is Jimmy Kimmel going to say tomorrow night? Who might his guests be?

I mean, this is going to be illuminating about how he will handle his return.

STELTER: And how much he wants to make this bigger than just one show or just one comedian, right? Because certainly many in Hollywood believe this is a big, big test about free speech in the United States that's much bigger than Kimmel's show. So whether he really wants to embrace that or not, that'll be telling.

Disney stock, by the way, popped as soon as this headline crossed earlier this hour. The socks generally been down today. You can see the chart perhaps on screen. A sudden spike upward when this news broke.

That just speaks to how big this was becoming for Disney as a corporation. And it's telling that the statement about this, it did not come from Jimmy Kimmel's publicist at ABC. It came from Disney as a company.

It came from Bob Iger's office. He's the CEO of Disney. He was feeling the pressure about this and certainly had to deal with this personally and directly.

SANCHEZ: Terry Moran is back with us. Terry, as an ABC veteran, I wonder what you make of this news, given the pressure that Bob Iger was under.

MORAN: He's under tremendous pressure. I know that he and Jimmy Kimmel are close. So they were discussing this cordially.

And then I think he has a sense of where this story is going, that because the Hollywood community, which is obviously is essential to Disney's business, was strongly against taking Kimmel off the air. And because that sense that the country doesn't want to pick off comedians one by one.

There are people in MAGA wants to. The president wants to pick off anybody who he disagrees with or who's mean to him. But we're still Americans. And I think it's bad for business to go against that.

KEILAR: What are you looking for tomorrow night in what is such a critical moment when it comes to free speech and how the president approaches that? You've written a lot about that. What are you looking for?

MORAN: Well, first, I'll look for how many stations are taking the Kimmel show. That'll show if the battle is still going or if, in fact, this is a step beyond that moment.

And then I'll also look for what he says. That's what we're all going to look for. How tough is he on what happened to him? How open is he to reaching out to the people who found what he said divisive or hurtful?

It's going to be a moment.

SANCHEZ: Yes, no question. A huge moment in American history. It's notable, given the uncertainty surrounding where this was all headed. It wasn't clear. And now it seems like Jimmy Kimmel, again, the breaking news, is going to return to the air tomorrow night. ABC putting out a statement that they have decided, after thoughtful conversations, to return the show on Tuesday.

[15:55:00]

KEILAR: Yes, that's exactly right. And they do obviously have some issues with what he said. That they had suspended him initially, indefinitely characterized by some of those who were very gleeful at Jimmy Kimmel's suspension as a firing. But it is not in this case. They are saying that they did the suspension because, quote, they felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive.

And they've been spending the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy. And after those conversations, we reached the decision to return to the show on Tuesday.

SANCHEZ: Yes, thank you to Terry Moran, Brian Stelter, Elizabeth Wagmeister. We're going to continue following this major breaking story.

Jimmy Kimmel returning to the air tomorrow night.

Stay with CNN, "THE ARENA" with Kasie Hunt continues after a quick break.

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