Carr’s complaints were dismissed by then-FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel in January 2025 and then revived by Carr after Trump appointed him to the chairmanship. Carr has continued to make allegations of news distortion, including threatening to revoke the licenses of ABC stations that air Jimmy Kimmel’s show.
During the Kimmel controversy, Carr said he was “trying to empower local TV stations to meet the needs of local communities.” The FCC subsequently initiated a proceeding titled “Empowering Local Broadcast TV Stations to Meet Their Public Interest Obligations: Exploring the Market Dynamics Between National Programmers and Their Affiliates”.
The FCC invited public comments on whether the rules should be adopted “in light of changes in the broadcast market given anti-competitive leverage and behavior by large networks.” This may include prohibiting certain types of contract provisions in agreements between networks and affiliate stations and strengthening the rights of local stations to reject national programming.
FCC criticized for attacks on media
The “Strengthening Local Broadcast TV Stations” proceeding is the proceeding in which the Center for American Rights submitted its comments. In addition to discussions on NPR and PBS, the group said the national networks “indoctrinate the American people with their leftist viewpoints.”
“Persistent bias at ABC SceneFor example, women who voted for President Trump in red states have been told that they are responsible for bringing an autocratic dictator to power,” the Center for American Rights said.
Comments yesterday on the FCC action came from the National Hispanic Media Coalition (NHMC), which criticized Carr’s war on the media. “The public notice bills this action as an effort to ’empower local broadcasters’ in their dealings with national networks. But… recent FCC actions risk using regulatory authority not to promote independent journalism, but to influence newsroom behavior, hinder editorial decision making, and encourage outcomes tailored to the personal or political interests of elected officials,” NHMC said.
The group said it supports “real local journalism and strong competition”, but added:
The policies that reshape the balance of power between station groups, networks, and newsrooms cannot be separated from the broader regulatory environment in which they operate. Several of the Commission’s recent interventions – including the coercive terms associated with the Skydance/Paramount transaction and the unlawful threats it made to ABC and its affiliate stations in September, demanding that Jimmy Kimmel’s show be removed from the airwaves – demonstrate how regulatory tools can be deployed in ways that undermine media independence and risk political interference in programming and editorial decisions.
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