From WNYC Studios. I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Wednesday, September 24th.

I want to play a few clips from Jimmy Kimmel's monologue last night as he returned to ABC after his suspension over something

he said after the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

And we'll talk in this segment for a few minutes with a guest who works full time to advance

free speech rights on both the left and the right.

Can there be a single standard that Americans can largely agree upon on campuses and the Trump administration and anywhere else?

First, here's Kimmel's explanation of the line that got him in so much trouble on the night after the murder,

when Kimmel said, quote, we hit 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 and doing everything they can to score political

points from it, unquote. Of course, it seems from the evidence that the shooter was not MAGA,

and if Kimmel seems to suggest there that he was convinced the shooter was Maga, here's how he

addressed that last night, beginning with what he had posted before that monologue after

Charlie Kirk was killed. I posted a message on Instagram on the Dave's killed sending love to his

family and asking for compassion, and I meant it. I still do.

Nor was it my intention to blame any specific group for the actions of what it was obviously a deeply disturbed individual.

That was really the opposite of the point I was trying to make.

But I understand that to some that felt either ill-timed or unclear or maybe both.

And for those who think I did

point a finger, I get why you're upset. If the situation was reversed, there was a good chance

I'd have felt the same way. So Jimmy Kimmel, with his voice breaking there, as you heard,

said that last night. He has critics and supporters on that part, as maybe you've been seeing

with critics arguing, for example, that you didn't really apologize and should have used

...