Rosie O’Donnell has claimed that ABC rejected a segment she had planned for Jimmy Kimmel Live! featuring Jeffrey Epstein survivors, which she ended up releasing on her own social media channels.
The comedian, 64, took over Kimmel’s late night show for a week last month during the regular host’s summer break.
“My idea for the last night [of her appearances] was to do the Epstein reveal, and they said that they were certain that could not happen,” O’Donnell said during a recent appearance on the Jann Arden Podcast. “And so I said, ‘Well, then I’m going to do it myself and just put it out.’”
The Independent has contacted ABC for comment.
O’Donnell’s video featured the seven women dressed in white and singing Helen Reddy’s “I Am Woman” in response to Attorney General Todd Blanche’s assertion that he did “not know if there are men out there who abused these women.” Kimmel, 58, re-posted the video on his Instagram Story.
“These eight women were a cross-section. And we met, and I told them a little about my history, and I told them why it means so much to me and to the human race and why this is of vital importance, and it’s an epidemic in our country and in the world,” O’Donnell said on Arden’s podcast. “I thanked them for trusting me, and then we shot it in a few hours.”
The former The View host added that she now plans to do an in-depth story on each of the women. “I will do a segment on each of those women, up close and personal, and we’ll tell each of their stories, eight of them,” she said.
“I just think when there’s such gross injustice, it calls to me, and I feel like you know I have to use my voice.”
Elsewhere on the podcast, O’Donnell said she had also planned to end her opening monologue with a “Danny Boy” parody, replacing the lyrics with “Donnie Boy,” skewering Trump. However, ABC pulled the planned performance minutes before the show began.
“I had five minutes to prepare a different ending to the monologue,” she said. “Five minutes.”
O’Donnell was later allowed to do the bit during her final episode guest hosting.
O’Donnell’s claims come amid ABC’s legal troubles with Trump’s FCC.
Earlier this month, Kimmel moved his interview with Democratic Senate hopeful James Talarico to YouTube to avoid FCC meddling with their local broadcasting affiliates in Texas.
FCC chairman Brendan Carr later accused Kimmel and Talarico of using the interview as a “hoax” “for the purpose of getting clicks and donations.”
