Jimmy Kimmel Chokes Up In Passionate Monologue After Las Vegas Shooting

The late night host started "Jimmy Kimmel Live" with a passionate and raw 10-minute monologue dedicated to the victims of the tragedy, calling out Donald Trump, Sarah Huckabee Sanders and lawmakers who "continue to allow this to happen."

"Here we are again in the aftermath of another terrible, inexplicable, shocking and painful tragedy, this time in Las Vegas, which happens to by my hometown. As you know at least 59 people are dead, hundreds are wounded," Kimmel said last night. "Of course, we pray for the victims and their families and friends and we wonder why, even though there's probably no way to ever know why, a human being would do something like this to other human beings who are at a concert, having fun and listening to music."

After calling the shooter a "very sick person," Kimmel addressed the victims.

"This morning, we have children without parents and fathers without sons, mothers without daughters. We lost two police officers. We lost a nurse from Tennessee. A special-ed teacher from a local school here in Manhattan Beach. It's the kind of thing that makes you want to throw up or give up," he continued. "It's too much to even process, all these devastated families who now have to live with this pain forever because one person with a violent and insane voice in his head managed to stockpile a collection of high-powered rifles and use them to shoot people."

Kimmel then addressed critics who say "there's nothing we can do about it," since gunman Stephan Paddock purchased the guns legally and passed background checks.

"There are a lot of things we can do about it. But we don't, which is interesting. Because when someone with a beard attacks us, we tap phones, we invoke travel bans, we build walls, we take every possible precaution to make sure it doesn't happen again," he said. "But when an American buys a gun and kills other Americans, then there's nothing we can do about that. And the Second Amendment, I guess, our forefathers wanted us to have AK-47s is the argument, I assume."

"They're weapons designed to kill large numbers of people in the shortest possible amount of time. And this guy, reportedly he had 10 of them in his room, apparently legally," Kimmel went on. "At least some of them were there legally. Why is that allowed? I don't know why our so-called leaders continue to allow this to happen. Or, better question, why do we continue to let them allow it to happen?"

"And you know what will happen, we'll pray for Las Vegas. Some of us will get motivated, some of us won't get motivated. The bills will be written, they'll be watered down, they'll fail," he added. "The NRA will smother it all with money and over time we'll get distracted, we'll move on to the next thing. And then it will happen again. And again."

Kimmel then called out Sarah Huckabee Sanders for comments she made at Monday's White House press briefing about gun control. "There will certainly be a time for that policy discussion to take place, but that's not the place that we're in at this moment," she said.

"I don't know, we have 59 innocent people dead, it wasn't their time either," Kimmel said in return. "So I think now is the time for political debate."

Of Donald Trump and his cabinet, he added, "He said he was praying for those who lost their lives. You know, in February, he also signed a bill that made it easier for people with severe mental illness to buy guns legally. The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, the speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, a number of other lawmakers who won't do anything about this because the NRA has their balls in a money clip, also sent their thoughts and their prayers today — which is good. They should be praying. They should be praying for God to forgive them for letting the gun lobby run this country. Because it is, it is so crazy."

"I want this to be a comedy show. I hate talking about stuff like this. I just want to laugh about things every night, but that, it seems to becoming increasingly difficult lately," he said near the end of his speech. "It feels like someone has opened a window into hell. And what I'm talking about tonight isn't about gun control, it's about common sense. Common sense says no good will ever come from allowing a person to have weapons that can take down 527 Americans at a concert. Common sense says you don't let those who suffer from mental illness buy guns."

"Maybe I'm nuts, but I would like to think we could put politics aside and agree that no American citizen needs an M-16 or 10 of them," he added. "And maybe that way, we don't do this again. And that seems very reasonable to me. I'm sorry for getting emotional, I'm not great with this kind of thing. But I just think its important, you know?"