FCC, NAB File Reply Briefs in Prometheus SCOTUS Appeal
The FCC correctly decided it couldn’t retain outdated broadcast rules based on the hope that they promoted minority and female ownership, said the agency and broadcasters in replies Friday to the Supreme Court for the appeal of the 3rd Circuit’s…
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Prometheus IV decision on media ownership (see 2012230062). The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ “15-year blockade of reasonable reforms, based on its atextual policy preferences, must now come to an end,” said NAB and broadcast industry petitioners. The 3rd Circuit’s order that the FCC gather a record on the likely effect of rule changes on minority and female ownership is “untenable,” the agency said. The FCC has treated ownership diversity as a “relevant criterion,” but it isn’t given “controlling weight,” and the ownership rule changes were adopted to benefit competition and localism, the brief said. The Prometheus public interest group arguments “flyspeck” the FCC’s reasoning and ignore “the agency’s cautious approach to a complicated question on an imperfect record,” the agency said. “The judgment of the court of appeals should be reversed,” the agency said. Oral argument is Jan. 19.