Trump's re-election as president prompted Jimmy Kimmel to become Italian citizen

Jimmy Kimmel: 'What’s going on is as bad as you thought it was gonna be. It’s so much worse – it’s just unbelievable. I feel like it’s probably even worse than he would like it to be.' File photo: AP/Chris Pizzello

Jimmy Kimmel has revealed he acquired Italian citizenship due to Donald Trump’s presidency, the latest in a wave of celebrities to make contingency plans after his re-election in 2024.

Speaking on The Sarah Silverman Podcast, the US late-night host confirmed the news. Italian news agency Ansa confirmed Kimmel had obtained Italian citizenship earlier this year after proving his ancestral lineage.

“A lot of people I know are thinking about, where are they going to get citizenship?” Silverman said of the wider exodus in response to Trump’s re-election.

“I did get Italian citizenship,” Kimmel said. “What’s going on is as bad as you thought it was gonna be. It’s so much worse – it’s just unbelievable. I feel like it’s probably even worse than he would like it to be.” 

In June, Kimmel spoke of his heritage at an Italian Republic Day event in Los Angeles, telling the audience that his grandfather’s parents moved to New York from Ischia, an island off the coast of Naples, after an earthquake in 1883 killed most of their family.

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“I have just obtained citizenship, thanks to my beloved grandmother Edith, whose family came from Candida, in the province of Avellino. She used to repeat to me, ‘You have the brain of a hamster!’” he reportedly told the audience.

Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland in January, while Ellen DeGeneres recently confirmed she and her wife, the actor Portia de Rossi, decided to relocate to Britain after Trump’s election last year.

She also expressed concern for the future of LGBT+ rights in the US, hinting that she and De Rossi may get married again in Britain due to the possibility that same-sex marriage could be overturned in the US.

Kimmel is among a cohort of late-night hosts, including John Oliver, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, who regularly use their shows as a platform to criticise the Trump administration. In May, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert was controversially axed by CBS, not long after he criticised the network’s decision to settle a $16m lawsuit with Trump on-air.

Speaking on Silverman’s show, Kimmel said former Trump supporters who found themselves in opposition to his agenda in office should be supported.

“Now you see these clips of Joe Rogan saying, ‘Why is he doing this? Why are you deporting people?’ And people go, ‘Fuck you! You supported him.’ I don’t buy into that,” Kimmel said.

The Guardian