A who’s who of Hollywood quickly rallied to his side after ABC unceremoniously dumped him from his late night show for vile comments about Charlie Kirk.

But one of Jimmy Kimmel‘s best friends of over a decade has remained mysteriously silent, despite calls for her to weigh in.

Jennifer Aniston, who regularly hangs out with the TV host and even invites him to her Thanksgiving parties, hasn’t uttered a word on his axing.

Now, insiders have revealed she’s being urged to remain quiet – no matter how hard it is for her.

The source said the Friends star is ‘100 percent in his corner’, but her team has warned her speaking out will invoke a huge backlash.

Kimmel was ditched by ABC after suggesting Kirk’s assassin was MAGA and arguing Republicans were trying to weaponize the attack to garner more support.

It provoked outrage on the Right and the chair of the FCC threatened and investigation into the network.

Last week executives pulled Jimmy Kimmel Live! off air ‘indefinitely’, which saw fury from the Left and celebrities claiming it was due to government interference.

Jennifer Aniston, 56, ‘desperately wants’ to defend Jimmy Kimmel, 57, but her team is ‘concerned it could hurt her career,’ a source told the Daily Mail

The actress and the late-night host have been friends for over a decade

But throughout the bluster, one voice remained silent, with Aniston neither posting anything nor taking to the airwaves to criticize the decision.

A source told the Daily Mail this week: ‘Jen and Jimmy have been very close friends for years.

‘She desperately wants to come out in support of him being pulled off the air over his comments because she’s one hundred percent in his corner.

‘However, her reps are advising her this is one time she should stay out of the conversation.’

They continued: ‘Her representatives are strongly advising her to restrain herself about Kimmel publicly for fear of the backlash.’

Still, it’s a ‘very hard decision’ for the actress to make as she’s ‘not a person who holds back’ and often ‘speaks her mind,’ the source said.

In 2019, Aniston cooked homemade enchiladas for Kimmel during her Friendsgiving celebration as part of an inside joke between the pair

Aniston and Kimmel, 57, have a friendship that spans over a decade.

The pair first crossed paths in 2012, when Kimmel and his wife, Molly McNearney, invited actor Justin Theroux to their home in Los Angeles.

McNearney, who married Kimmel in 2013 and served as head writer on Jimmy Kimmel Live! from 2008 to 2023, explained in an essay for InStyle that Aniston was dating Theroux at the time.

‘At first I was a bit star-struck that Rachel Green was standing near my bananas,’ McNearney recalled. ‘But my nerves faded as soon as she hugged me, pulled a lime off our tree for her vodka rocks, and dissected The Bachelor.’

‘She was immediately warm, like an old friend. She’s magnetic like that. No boundaries, no b*******, and a lot of laughing,’ she wrote.

Three years later, Kimmel would officiate Aniston and Theroux’s wedding in 2015, though they divorced in 2018.

The couple are frequent guests at Aniston’s annual Friendsgiving, which is typically held in November before the Thanksgiving holiday.

In 2019, Aniston hosted a star-studded Friendsgiving that included her Friends co-star Courteney Cox, pal Jason Bateman, and of course Kimmel on the guest list.

Aniston labeled the dish ‘Jimmy’s f**king enchiladas,’ in a post seen on her Instagram

She also poked fun at Kimmel during the festivities by cooking homemade enchiladas for the late night host.

When Aniston appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! prior to the gathering, he complained that they should eat Mexican food on Friendsgiving to save the traditional Thanksgiving food for the actual holiday.

As such, Aniston cooked and labeled the dish ‘Jimmy’s f**king enchiladas’ for the 2019 celebration, sharing a video of his reaction to her Instagram.

The trio have also gone on multiple international excursions together, as Aniston traveled with the married couple to Tahiti in March 2018 to celebrate McNearney’s birthday.

She also attended the writer’s 40th birthday party that same month, where she posed for photos with McNearney, Tobey Maguire’s ex-wife Jen Meyer, and Bateman’s wife Amanda Anka in a photo booth.

Most recently, Aniston shared a ‘summertime photo dump’ on Instagram in September 2023 that featured photos of herself with Kimmel, McNearney, Bateman and Aanka all posing together on a beach.

Aniston shared a video of Kimmel’s reaction to the enchiladas

Despite their close friendship, the insider explained that Aniston has refrained from publicly defending Kimmel after his show was suspended indefinitely because her team is ‘concerned it could hurt her career.’

What’s more, the fourth season of her Apple TV+ series The Morning Show premiered on September 17, as Aniston hit the red carpet last week for the show’s premiere party in New York City.

Leading up to the 2024 presidential election, Aniston made a political statement calling out Vice President JD Vance for his controversial ‘childless cat ladies’ comment.

The actress reposted the infamous clip of Vance’s interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson in 2021, as the Ohio senator claimed the US was run by ‘a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable too.’

Aniston, writing to her 44.6 million followers, shared on Instagram: ‘I truly can’t believe that this is coming from a potential VP of the United States.

‘All I can say is… Mr Vance, I pray that your daughter is fortunate enough to bear children of her own one day,’ she continued.

In her message, the actress also hinted at her own struggles to conceive a child through in-vitro fertilization and hit out at Vance’s opposition towards the Democrat-led Right to IVF Act.

‘I hope she will not need to turn to IVF as a second option,’ she added, ‘Because you are trying to take that away from her, too.’

Aniston often shares snaps of her group vacations with Jimmy Kimmel and his wife Molly McNearney, along with Jason Bateman and his wife Amanda Anka

The trio posed together on vacation in an Instagram snap shared by Aniston in September 2023

Aniston was pictured spending time with Kimmel, Bateman and their wives

She also spoke out against President Donald Trump in 2020 amid the Covid-19 pandemic, as she encouraged her followers to vote for President Joe Biden and shared photos of herself dropping off her mail-in ballot.

‘Our current President has decided that racism is a non-issue. He has repeatedly and publicly ignored science… too many people have died,’ she wrote, adding: ‘Vote for equal human rights, for love, and for decency.’

The Daily Mail has contacted representatives for Aniston for comment.

Kimmel has kept a low-profile since Wednesday, when ABC announced it was suspending his late-night show ‘indefinitely’ following his controversial remarks about the man accused of shooting conservative commentator Kirk.

Kimmel has kept a low-profile since Wednesday, when ABC announced Jimmy Kimmel Live! was suspended ‘indefinitely’ following his on-air comments about Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin

Kimmel had claimed that Tyler Robinson, 22, was a conservative, despite investigators saying that Robinson held far-left ideologies and was dating his transgender roommate.

While Aniston has yet to speak out following Kimmel’s cancellation, their fellow close friend Jason Bateman was asked about his response to the news during an appearance on NBC’s Today show with Craig Melvin.

‘Well, it’s troubling to say the least,’ the actor said on Thursday. ‘And we all have to really take a moment and figure how we feel about this type of thing.

‘Especially, people doing what you do,’ he added.

‘I’m sure there’s going to be some sort of collective move to respond to this, but I’m not smart enough or powerful enough to be the one to do it.

‘But I imagine there’s plenty of conversations going on to do something, because you just can’t stand by and let stuff like that go on.’

Melvin then probed, ‘Stuff like?’ to which Bateman responded: ‘Well, Jimmy getting his show pulled for freedom of speech.’