FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr is calling for an FCC investigation into whether NBC violated the agency’s equal time rules by broadcasting an appearance by Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris’ Saturday Night Live over the weekend. However, the agency, communications attorneys and academics say the network appears to have complied when it provided free air time to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump during major sports broadcasts Sunday. “I think the credibility and integrity of the FCC is on the line here,” Carr said Sunday in an interview on X. But a spokesperson for Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a post on X Monday said, “Our rules do not require that a network seek out opposing campaigns to offer the time,” adding, “the rival candidates have to request it. The requirements outlined under the FCC's ‘equal time’ rules here have been satisfied.”
The outcome of Tuesday's Senate elections could scramble Senate Commerce Committee Republicans’ leadership structure given the competitive contest between ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Rep. Colin Allred, his Democratic challenger. Four other panel members also face tough or competitive reelection fights (see 2411040051). Democratic leaders on the House and Senate Commerce committees indicated they intend to stay in those roles in the upcoming 119th Congress regardless of the election’s outcome.
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Thursday filed a $10 billion lawsuit complaint against CBS that quotes FCC Commissioners Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington supporting allegations that the network deceived its audience when it edited an answer in an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democrats' presidential nominee. Meanwhile, former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler on Friday said a future FCC chair in a second Trump administration would likely face considerable pressure to act against media outlets. During a Center for American Progress webinar, Wheeler said a Trump appointee could encounter a situation that no FCC chairman has "faced in the 90-year history of the commission.”
Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, will likely redirect the panel's airwaves legislative focus toward a version of his 2024 Spectrum Pipeline Act (S-3909) next year should Republicans control the Senate after the Nov. 5 elections and he becomes chairman. Cruz could face continued headwinds from DOD's staunchest Capitol Hill backers if he pursues legislation similar to S-3909, lobbyists and others predicted. Current Senate Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., hopes she can attach her rival Spectrum and National Security Act (S-4207) to an end-of-year omnibus package (see 2409170066).
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, a member of his transition team and Elon Musk, X platform owner and SpaceX CEO, are repeating calls for broadcasters to lose their spectrum because their news broadcasts are too partisan.
Digital First Project Executive Director Nathan Leamer on Wednesday said whoever chairs the FCC during the next administration should take on a more forceful role in advocating for Congress to renew the commission’s lapsed spectrum auction authority. Leamer, who served as an aide to former FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, said during a Georgetown University Center for Business and Public Policy webcast that whichever party wins the White House Nov. 5 will reexamine broadband affordability issues. He believes the FCC will have to brace for the impact of potential federal court rulings striking down its recent orders reclassifying broadband as a Communications Act Title II service and instituting anti-digital discrimination rules.
NAB CEO Curtis LeGeyt denounced threats of government action against broadcast licenses after Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump sent CBS legal threats and a court affidavit indicated the Florida Governor's Office was behind that state’s efforts to prosecute TV stations that carried an abortion rights ad (see 2410180050). Although Trump has publicly called for federal action against broadcast licenses nearly every other week since his September debate with the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, NAB was silent on the issue until now.
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump continued his calls this week for government against CBS over editing of a 60 Minutes interview with his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris (see 2410170051). “When will CBS release their Transcript of the fraudulent Interview with Comrade Kamala Harris?” Trump posted Monday on Truth Social. “This may be the Biggest Scandal in Broadcast History!” In an interview with Fox News' Howard Kurtz Sunday, Trump said he was seeking to subpoena CBS’ records about the interview that ran earlier this month. In addition, he said that 60 Minutes should be taken off the air. When Kurtz responded that FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel has said the agency would never yank a broadcaster’s license because of a politician’s objections to an interview, Trump appeared unfamiliar with her statement. “Really?” he responded, before reiterating his objections. Trump’s accusations against 60 Minutes are “false,” the program said in a statement Sunday night. 60 Minutes “gave an excerpt of our interview to Face the Nation that used a longer section of her answer than that on 60 Minutes. Same question. Same answer. But a different portion of the response,” the statement said. Harris’ answer on 60 Minutes “was more succinct, which allows time for other subjects in a wide ranging 21-minute-long segment,” the program said. In a post on X Monday, FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington appeared to suggest that 60 Minutes' editing was unlikely to run afoul of the FCC's news distortion rules. "Broadcast news distortion is an extraordinarily narrow complaint category," Simington said. "CBS could easily remove the predicate for any further discussion by releasing the transcript." In a Fox interview last week, Simington appeared to lean the other way (see 2410180058), describing the news distortion complaint against CBS as not "facially ridiculous." He also promised to look into the matter in an online post that Trump shared.
Congressional Republicans are eyeing potential legislative changes to rein in what they view as NTIA’s flawed implementation of the $42.5 billion broadband equity, access and deployment program if the party wins control of Capitol Hill in the Nov. 5 elections. GOP lawmakers are stopping short of publicly suggesting Congress claw back BEAD funding, but Democrats are raising concerns about that possibility. Policy experts expect it will be difficult for lawmakers to reach a consensus on major BEAD changes during the next Congress given the Hill’s polarized reactions to the program over the past year.
A news distortion complaint filed at the FCC against CBS isn’t “facially ridiculous,” said Commissioner Nathan Simington in a Fox News segment Thursday, though he also vowed not to “prejudge” the matter. The complaint argues that editing of an interview with Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris changed her answer to a question on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, making it sound more favorable. Although the complaint was brought against CBS’ owned and operated station WCBS New York, the content it focuses on was from network programs Face the Nation and 60 Minutes. For the FCC to find that news distortion occurred, the conduct would have had to occur at the level of the licensee rather than the network, Simington said. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Thursday had reposted on Truth Social Simington's early posting about the complaint in which the commissioner wrote, “Interesting. Big if true. Will look into it.” Trump appointed Simington to the FCC in 2020, after the then-president withdrew his renomination of former Commissioner Mike O’Rielly in the wake of an O'Rielly speech critical of social media content regulation that the executive branch proposed.