Pakistani American Legal Luminary Urges Jimmy Kimmel to Sue Trump, Citing ‘Strong Odds at the Supreme Court’

When one of America’s most cited constitutional law scholars argues that a late-night comedian has “strong odds at the Supreme Court,” it’s worth paying attention. Aziz Huq’s analysis of Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension from ABC represents more than academic theorizing—it’s a roadmap for what could become a landmark First Amendment case.

Huq, the Frank and Bernice J. Greenberg Professor of Law at the University of Chicago, has built his reputation studying the precise constitutional issues now swirling around Kimmel’s removal from television. His expertise in government overreach, democratic backsliding, and the boundaries of free speech gives unusual weight to his argument that the Trump administration has crossed a clear constitutional line.

The Scholar Behind the Analysis

Huq is recognized as “one of the most cited active scholars of constitutional law in the United States” and holds the Frank and Bernice J. Greenberg professorship at Chicago Law. His research focuses specifically on “the interaction of constitutional design with individual rights and liberties”—exactly the tension at the heart of the Kimmel controversy.

His recent work concerns democratic backsliding and what he calls a “dual state”—where a “lawless zone runs parallel” to existing legal systems. This academic focus on governmental abuse of power lends particular credibility to his analysis of the Trump administration’s pressure campaign against ABC.

The timing of Huq’s intervention is also significant. He recently received the Abner J. Mikva Award from the American Constitution Society’s Chicago Lawyer Chapter, recognizing his expertise in constitutional law. The award, named for a legendary federal judge and former White House counsel, underscores Huq’s standing in the legal community.

The Constitutional Framework

Huq’s argument rests on established First Amendment doctrine that even conservative Supreme Court justices have embraced. He points to recent cases where the Court unanimously held that the government cannot use “the threat of invoking legal sanctions and other means of coercion to achieve the suppression of disfavored speech.”

The professor draws a deliberate parallel to Republican complaints during the Biden administration about federal pressure on social media companies regarding COVID-19 misinformation. Then, conservatives like Senator Eric Schmitt called such cases among “the most important free speech cases in a generation.” Justice Samuel Alito led the charge against government “jawboning” of private companies.

While acknowledging that Kimmel may have contractual remedies against ABC, Huq argues the comedian also has “a powerful constitutional claim for prospective relief and damages against the federal government.”

“Today, the shoe is on the other foot,” Huq writes in Politico. “It is a Republican administration that is using the threat of regulatory investigations and sanctions against a pillar of the American media—ABC, which is owned by Disney—to silence speech it disdains.”

The Evidence Trail

What distinguishes Kimmel’s potential case from previous government jawboning disputes is the clarity of the evidence. When the Supreme Court dismissed the COVID-social media case against the Biden administration, Justice Amy Coney Barrett cited a “lack of specific causation findings with respect to any discrete instance of content moderation.”

Huq argues that problem doesn’t exist here. The timeline is stark: FCC Chair Brendan Carr appears on a podcast, explicitly threatens ABC over Kimmel’s comments about conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin, and within hours, the network removes Kimmel from the air.

“The evidence of ‘specific causation’ is plain to see,” Huq writes. “Carr threatens ABC unless it sanctions Kimmel. ABC does as Carr asks.”

Under Supreme Court precedent, Huq explains that a plaintiff must show the government’s conduct could be “reasonably understood to convey a threat of adverse government action in order to punish or suppress the plaintiff’s speech.”

Carr’s podcast appearance seems to meet this standard directly. The FCC chair described Kimmel’s remarks as part of a “concerted effort to lie to the American people” and warned that “we can do this the easy way or the hard way.” He explicitly threatened that companies must “take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

The threat carries particular weight given the FCC’s regulatory authority over broadcasting licenses and its pending review of Nexstar’s $6.2 billion acquisition of Tegna—a deal that could influence how ABC affiliates treat network programming.

Precedent and Pattern

Huq situates the Kimmel incident within a broader pattern of Trump administration pressure on media companies. He notes that Carr previously issued threats against Comcast, demanding more favorable coverage of Republicans from NBC affiliates. The administration has also used executive orders to punish law firms for representing disfavored clients.

This pattern matters legally because it suggests systematic rather than isolated government misconduct. Courts often look for evidence that constitutional violations represent official policy rather than rogue behavior by individual officials.

The Irony Factor

Perhaps most pointedly, Huq notes that Trump himself filed similar lawsuits in 2021, alleging that government jawboning led to suppression of his speech on social media platforms. “A principled consistency would require those who objected to the Biden administration’s engagement with social media firms to support Kimmel,” Huq observes, though he adds parenthetically: “To be clear, I am not holding my breath.”

Huq frames a potential lawsuit as serving broader democratic interests beyond Kimmel’s career. “It would be a way of defending a sorely tested bulwark of the free press, one that has come under increasing strain in recent days and months,” he writes.

This perspective reflects Huq’s academic focus on democratic institutions and constitutional safeguards. His scholarship consistently examines how legal mechanisms can protect democratic norms against authoritarian pressure—exactly the dynamic he sees in the Kimmel case.

While acknowledging that Kimmel may have contractual remedies against ABC, Huq argues the comedian also has “a powerful constitutional claim for prospective relief and damages against the federal government.” The professor suggests Kimmel should sue not just ABC, but “the government officials who were the driving force for his embarrassing public disciplining.”

Such a lawsuit would test whether courts will enforce First Amendment principles consistently, regardless of the political party wielding government power. For Huq, it represents another opportunity for Kimmel to “speak truth to misused power—just with fewer jokes.”

Academic Authority Meets Real-World Stakes

Huq’s analysis carries weight precisely because it comes from someone whose career has been built studying these exact constitutional questions. His extensive scholarship on government overreach, combined with his recognition as one of America’s most cited constitutional law experts, lends unusual authority to his conclusion that Kimmel has “strong odds at the Supreme Court.”

Whether Kimmel will actually file such a lawsuit remains unclear. But Huq’s analysis provides a constitutional roadmap that could transform a late-night television controversy into a defining First Amendment case for the digital age. In an era when democratic norms face increasing pressure, the professor’s argument suggests the courts may be the last line of defense against government efforts to silence critical voices in American media.

This story was aggregated by AI from several news reports and edited by American Kahani’s News Desk.