Jimmy Kimmel doubles down, slams Sen. Bill Cassidy and Trump over health-care bill

“I had an interesting day today,” Jimmy Kimmel said at the top of his late-night show Wednesday, which was quite the understatement. Kimmel saw his monologue about health care go viral after he tore into Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) on Tuesday night for the “horrible bill” that he proposed with Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) as the Senate tries to repeal Obamacare.

Kimmel took particular issue with Cassidy because the Louisiana senator appeared on his show in May and said he would oppose a health-care bill in which people with preexisting conditions were not protected, or had an annual or lifetime cap for insurance companies. Cassidy nicknamed some of these guidelines the “Jimmy Kimmel test,” as it was right after Kimmel had publicly discussed his newborn son’s harrowing open heart surgery, and pleaded with officials to consider the astronomical cost of medical care for families who can’t afford it.

“But unfortunately and puzzlingly, [Cassidy] proposed a bill that would allow states to do all the things he said he would not let them do,” Kimmel said. “He made a total about-face, which means he either doesn’t understand his own bill, or he lied to me. It’s simple as that.”

After Kimmel unloaded on Cassidy, he had lots of supporters — and also lots of criticism. On Wednesday night, although Kimmel joked that he didn’t want to turn this into a Taylor Swift-Kanye West-levelfeud, he doubled down and slammed some of his critics. Here were all his targets:

Sen. Bill Cassidy

Kimmel: “It was a bad morning for Senator Cassidy. He and his co-sponsor, Lindsey Graham, spent the morning defending the indefensible. This morning, the senator sat for an interview with Chris Cuomo, CNN, and pulled the ‘all comedians are dummies’ card.” (Clip of Cassidy saying, “I’m sorry he does not understand.”)

“Oh, I get it, I don’t understand because I’m a talk-show host, right? Well, then help me out. Which part don’t I understand? Is it the part where you cut $243 billion from federal health-care assistance? Am I not understanding the part where states would be allowed to let insurance companies price you out of coverage for having preexisting conditions? Maybe I don’t understand the part of your bill in which federal funding disappears completely after 2026? Or maybe it was the part where the plans are no longer required to pay for essential health benefits like maternity care or pediatric visits?