Jimmy Kimmel delivered an opening monologue almost wholly devoid of jokes yesterday, responding to a new health care bill proposed by Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham.

JIMMY KIMMEL CALLS OUT SEN. BILL CASSIDY

Cassidy appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! to talk about health care after Kimmel’s son was diagnosed with a congenital heart disease at birth, requiring multiple heart surgeries. Cassidy at the time said that he believes all Americans should be entitled to affordable health care, and went as far as to say that every proposed bill needs to pass the “Jimmy Kimmel Test,” meaning that the bill should protect anyone like Kimmel’s son who has a preexisting condition.

Now, Kimmel used his platform to call out Cassidy, who recently came out with a new health care bill, but it is one that does not pass his own test. “He said he would only support a health care bill that made sure a child like mine would get the health coverage he needs no matter how much money his parents make, and that did not have annual or lifetime caps… Senator Cassidy said his plan would do that too, he said all of this on television many times,” Kimmel said, playing a clip of Cassidy speaking to that point.

He then went into detail about the Graham-Cassidy Bill, saying, “It did pass the Jimmy Kimmel Test, but a different Jimmy Kimmel Test. With this one, your child with a preexisting condition will get the care he needs if and only if his father is Jimmy Kimmel,” he said. Kimmel then described a previous promise Cassidy had made about his ideal health care bill: “He said he wants coverage for all, no discrimination based on preexisting conditions, lower premiums for middle-class families, and no lifetime caps. And guess what, the new bill does none of those things.”

Kimmel gave his entire spiel about Cassidy almost without a single joke, and explained how the politicians want to make things complicated so that regular Americans won’t want to read it and will assume the politicians are taking care of it. “But they’re not taking care of you, they’re taking care of the people who give them money, like insurance companies… Most of the congresspeople voting on it probably won’t even read it, and they want us to do the same thing. They want us to treat it like a iTunes service agreement,” he joked. “And this guy Cassidy lied right to my face.”

Leave a comment

Read more about: