Jimmy Kimmel spends 99 percent of his time on TV cracking jokes, playing games, and encouraging parents to torture their kids at Halloween. It takes something of monumental personal importance—like American healthcare—to get him to break through that joking facade, but when it does, it’s usually a doozy.
Earlier tonight, Kimmel came out in force against Louisiana senator Bill Cassidy, slamming him with an anger bordering on righteous over the new Graham-Cassidy healthcare bill currently worming its way through the Senate. Kimmel was merciless, calling out Cassidy—who coined the phrase “The Jimmy Kimmel Test” for his healthcare aspirations after Kimmel made headlines a few months ago, discussing his son’s open-heart surgery and his heartfelt reflection on how impossible it would have been for him to pay for it were he not in such a privileged position—for lying to his face about putting together a bill that passed the test’s standards. (I.e., ensuring that, under the bill, a child born with congenital heart disease would be able to get all the care they needed in their first year of life.)
As Kimmel, put it, the bill—which he accused the Senate of trying to pass “like an iTunes service agreement”—passes another “Jimmy Kimmel test” entirely: “With this one, your child with a pre-existing condition will get the care he needs, if, and only if, his father is Jimmy Kimmel. Otherwise, you might be screwed.”
Kimmel ended the scathing monologue with a call to action, encouraging viewers to call their elected officials and protest the bill. Meanwhile, Bill Cassidy is presumably checking in to a burn ward somewhere, confident in the knowledge that his Congressional healthcare will cover all his bills.