Comedian Rosie O’Donnell surprised viewers of Jimmy Kimmel Live by making her first talkshow appearance this week as a host on US screens in more than 30 years.“It’s great to be back. They said you can’t come back again but here I am,” O’Donnell said to rapturous applause and shouts of “Rosie”. The comedian moved to Sandymount, Co Dublin, in January 2025, before Donald Trump was inaugurated for his second term as US president.O’Donnell said in in her monologue that Trump was the reason she left the US for Ireland. After reading Project2025, she thought, “I gotta get myself out of here”. “People say, ‘You moved to Ireland, just forget about Trump’. I can’t. The crimes are endless,” O’Donnell said to The Irish Times in an interview during her first summer in Dublin.O’Donnell, whose own talk show aired in the US from 1996-2002, said in her monologue that “a lot has changed since the 90s”, and since The Rosie O’Donnell Show was on air. There was “a war in the Middle East, climate change”, and a president who was “embroiled in scandals”, but jokingly assured the audience that it’s “chill now”. “If you thought the president hated Jimmy Kimmel Live when it was hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, buckle up, people.”“Hi [Trump],” she said, waving to the camera. “I know you’re watching”. Before moving to Ireland, O’Donnell told her then 11-year-old child Clay not to tell anyone. The next day, Clay told their entire class they would be leaving for Ireland because “the president of the United States hates my mother”. O’Donnell told the audience that when arriving in Ireland, she soon realised that the “people in Ireland are the kindest people I’ve ever met”, and Ireland has become her “salvation”. O’Donnell told a story of Irish “hospitality” when an Irish man stopped and said, “Welcome, Rosie, you’re home now. We love having you here.” She also told the story of Angela the “lollipop lady”, who knew every child in the school’s name and refused to believe that O’Donnell is the “famous actress” O’Donnell.Angela told O’Donnell the reason Clay runs past her every morning and after school is because they are embarrassed of her. O’Donnell responded by saying, “I’m from New York, kids get taken”. “Well, we’re not in New York any more,” Angela said.