ABC

After several weeks off for the holidays, Jimmy Kimmel was back on Monday night for his first show of 2024—and the moment clearly could not have come any sooner. The host wasted absolutely no time in addressing the reason his name has been all over the news the past week: Aaron Rodgers.

Last week, while appearing as a guest on Pat McAfee’s ESPN show, the New York Jets quarterback—and noted conspiracy theorist—claimed that he was anxiously awaiting the release of a new batch of documents related to convicted pedophile and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, hinting that Kimmel would be among the many A-list names with links to the late billionaire. Spoiler alert: It was not.

Dear Aasshole: for the record, I’ve not met, flown with, visited, or had any contact whatsoever with Epstein, nor will you find my name on any “list” other than the clearly-phony nonsense that soft-brained wackos like yourself can’t seem to distinguish from reality. Your reckless… https://t.co/p8eug12uiS

— Jimmy Kimmel (@jimmykimmel) January 2, 2024

While Kimmel took a break from his break to fire back at Rodgers, a.k.a. “Aasshole,” he saved the real shellacking for his first night back.

“I don’t know Jeffrey Epstein. I’ve never met Jeffrey Epstein. I was not on a list, or a plane, or an island or anything ever. And I suggested that if Aaron wanted to make false and very damaging statements like that, that we should do it in court so he could share his proof with, like, a judge. Because when you hear a guy who won a Super Bowl and did all the State Farm commercials say something like this, a lot of people believe him. A lot of delusional people honestly believe that I am meeting up with Tom Hanks and Oprah at Shakey’s once a week to eat pizza and drink the blood of children.”

The way Kimmel sees it, there are only two possible reasons why Rodgers decided to come at the host: Either he truly did believe that Kimmel’s name would be in those documents (“which is insane,” according to Kimmel) or he was attempting to get back at the host for some jokes he has made about him in the past.

Jimmy’s thoughts on quarterback Karen Rodgers… pic.twitter.com/mRh5VRUycz

— Jimmy Kimmel Live (@JimmyKimmelLive) January 9, 2024

Kimmel believes that that latter scenario is indeed the more likely reason for Rodgers’ attacks.

“This is how these nuts do it now,” he said. “You don’t like Trump? You’re a pedophile. It’s their go-to move, and it shows you how much they actually care about pedophilia.”

But Kimmel says he has dealt with plenty of guys like Rodgers, who he claims “genuinely thinks that because God gave him the ability to throw a ball, he’s smarter than everyone else… Aaron got two As on his report card: they were both in the name Aaron.”

“And can you imagine that this hamster-brained man thinks he knows what the government is up to because he’s a quarterback doing research on YouTube,” Kimmel jabbed.

And for anyone who wants to counter that Kimmel makes a living poking fun at other people, Kimmel has news for them: “We say a lot of things on this show, but we don’t make up lies. In fact, we have a team of people who work very hard to sift through facts and reputable sources before I make a joke… because the truth still matters.”

Ultimately, however, Kimmel is ready to forgive and forget the whole thing provided Rodgers does one thing: apologizes. “Which Aaron Rodgers should do, which is what a decent person would do, but I bet he won’t. If he does, you know what I’ll do? I’ll accept his apology and move on. But he probably won’t do that.”