Mike Rowe doubles down on defense of blue collar workers after ‘tone deaf’ Kimmel joke

After being scorned on social media, “Dirty Jobs” television show veteran Mike Rowe doubled down on his criticism of Jimmy Kimmel’s “tone deaf” monologues mocking new Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin for being a former plumber.

Rowe said he had not noticed his post about late-night host Kimmel “belittling plumbers” had gone viral because he had been too busy working.

“I want to apologize for not responding to any of the 22 thousand comments my last post inspired,” he wrote. “I’ve been filming all week and just noticed my observations about Jimmy Kimmel and a former plumber named Markwayne Mullin have gone viral.”

Rowe said that Kimmel’s digs at Mullin for being a former plumber are evidence of “longstanding stigmas and stereotypes” against blue-collar skilled trade workers as “uneducated, one-dimensional workers who never made it to college.”

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“I did not suggest – even remotely – that a plumber was inherently qualified to hold a cabinet position,” he wrote on X. “What I said was that being a plumber should not disqualify a person from holding such a position.”

Kimmel, a regular critic of the Trump administration, was recently criticized as elitist for using Mullin’s prior experience as a plumbing business owner as evidence that he is unqualified to lead the Department of Homeland Security. 

“Trump’s got a whole new generation of thinkers lined up, including his newly confirmed secretary of Homeland Security, Markwayne ‘Chuck Mike Bruce Dave’ Melon — Mullin. Maybe Melon’s better,” Kimmel said on air March 24. “He’s the now former senator of Oklahoma. Before he was elected to the Senate, Markwayne Mullin was a low-level MMA fighter and a plumber. That’s right. We have a plumber protecting us from terrorism now. It worked for Super Mario. Why not Markwayne?”

He continued, “But honestly — I mean, if Trump is going to keep picking these unqualified people to run the department, why not have more fun with it? I mean, next time, instead of Markwayne, how about Lil Wayne for Homeland Security? At least we can get a concert out of it, right?”

Kimmel later doubled down, saying, “I’m not upset that the head of Homeland Security used to be a plumber. I’m upset that he isn’t still a plumber.”

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Rowe had ripped late-night host Kimmel for the dig, saying he took offense at the “suggestion that skilled workers should never evolve into something new.” 

He asked if Mullin’s career progression from plumbing business owner to Congress and then to a top Cabinet official is “not the embodiment of the American Dream?”

On Friday, he wrote that stereotypes reinforced by jokes like Kimmel’s are contributing to a critical shortage of American skilled laborers. 

“Reasonable people can disagree as to what is funny and what isn’t. Frankly, I couldn’t care less. What I do care about,” he wrote, “is the extraordinary shortage of plumbers and electricians our country is facing, and the longstanding stigmas and stereotypes that continue to discourage people from considering a lucrative career in the skilled trades.”

“Jimmy’s joke – and his audience’s reaction to it,” wrote Rowe, “is proof positive that those stigmas and stereotypes are alive and well.”

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Digging even deeper, Rowe asked, “What do their credentials and diplomas have to do with their actual competency? Are we not already surrounded by a legion of perfectly qualified experts who don’t know what the hell they’re doing?”

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“Jimmy is entitled to his opinion, along with anyone else who believes that Mullin is unqualified to lead the DHS,” he wrote on X. “The Constitution, however, says otherwise, and so does the Senate.” 

Rowe, who runs a nonprofit promoting skilled labor careers called the mikeroweWORKS Foundation, concluded by encouraging people to launch a career in the skilled trades, saying, “Who knows? Could be the first step on your road to President.”

Fox News Digital reached out to spokespeople for Kimmel for comment.