The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Consumers' Research's challenge of the FCC's method for funding the USF under the nondelegation doctrine, in a ruling Friday (see 2212060070). The FCC "has not violated the private nondelegation doctrine because it wholly subordinates" the Universal Service Administrative Co., the court said, noting Congress "supplied the FCC with intelligible principles when it tasked the agency with overseeing" USF.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Consumers' Research's challenge of the FCC's method for funding the USF under the nondelegation doctrine, in a ruling Friday (see 2212060070). The FCC "has not violated the private nondelegation doctrine because it wholly subordinates" the Universal Service Administrative Co., the court said, noting Congress "supplied the FCC with intelligible principles when it tasked the agency with overseeing" USF.
The FCC’s administrative law judge won’t pause the hearing process and put the Standard/Tegna deal in front of the full commission, said an ALJ order Thursday. After that decision, Standard General asked three FCC commissioners to trigger “must vote” on the transaction, which would require Commissioner Geoffrey Starks to split with Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel to side with the agency’s Republicans. That's considered unlikely.
DirecTV litigation accusing Nexstar and its broadcast sidecars Mission and White Knight of colluding to set retransmission consent fee prices is likely more a retrans consent negotiation tactic than a direct attack on sidecar operations, broadcast lawyers told us.
Andrew Schwartzman is senior counselor for the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society (see 2303090064)
A conservative watchdog group that opposed the nomination of Gigi Sohn to the FCC is seeking information on “partisan political influences” on the agency over the Standard/Tegna deal, said a news release Thursday. The American Accountability Foundation (AAF) filed a Freedom of Information Act request seeking records of communications between FCC Media Bureau Chief Holly Saurer and deal opponents such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Andrew Schwartzman, Benton Foundation Institute for Broadband and Society senior counselor, who represents unions in the proceeding. “Let’s hope our nation’s television airwaves aren’t for sale to politically connected media moguls and disingenuous lawyers who failed to disclose multiple conflicts of interest,” said AAF President Tom Jones in the release. AAF opposed several nominations by President Joe Biden, and paid for a billboard in Las Vegas opposing Sohn, who withdrew from the nomination process this week. The FCC didn’t comment.
The FCC Media Bureau’s Standard/Tegna hearing designation order is “inappropriate,” based on issues outside the agency’s purview, and Congress should act, said NAB CEO Curtis LeGeyt in remarks at NAB’s State Leadership Conference Tuesday (see 2302270066). The HDO sets a precedent expanding the reasons the FCC could refer a deal to an administrative law judge, attorneys and industry officials told us. Congress should act to codify the agency’s 180-day merger shot clock and define what constitutes the public interest in an FCC transaction review, LeGeyt said. The FCC’s current public interest standard has been interpreted to allow the agency “to extract ad hoc concessions whether or not they fall within the FCC's expertise or mandate," LeGeyt said.
Standard General founder Soohyung Kim is “optimistic” regulators will approve the company's proposed $8.6 billion buy of Tegna before Feb. 22, the merger agreement date on which Tegna can choose to pull out of the deal or trigger a 50% increase in the ongoing ticking fee, increasing the purchase price, he said on a press call Monday. Friday was the end of an FCC comment period on concessions offered by Standard (see 2301170064), and the company told the agency it doesn’t object to those concessions being codified as merger conditions, though it resisted requests from MVPDs and public interest groups. New Tegna would be the nation’s second-largest broadcaster by revenue, Kim said.
Procedural concerns could complicate a case at the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on a New York law requiring affordable broadband. At oral argument Thursday in Manhattan, Judge Richard Sullivan grilled parties on a procedural maneuver they used to move the case to the 2nd Circuit from the trial court. Sullivan asked New York’s attorney tough questions on the state’s argument that its law isn’t preempted.
Procedural concerns could complicate a case at the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on a New York law requiring affordable broadband. At oral argument Thursday in Manhattan, Judge Richard Sullivan grilled parties on a procedural maneuver they used to move the case to the 2nd Circuit from the trial court. Sullivan asked New York’s attorney tough questions on the state’s argument that its law isn’t preempted.