{"id":5059,"date":"2026-07-28T15:07:55","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T15:07:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5059"},"modified":"2026-07-28T15:07:55","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T15:07:55","slug":"fcc-slammed-by-former-agency-officials-over-review-of-abcs-licenses-an-assault-on-free-speech-disguised-as-regulatory-process","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5059","title":{"rendered":"FCC Slammed by Former Agency Officials Over Review of ABC\u2019s Licenses: \u2018An Assault on Free Speech Disguised as Regulatory Process\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\tThe FCC and its current chairman, Brendan Carr, were blasted by former heads of the agency and other officials as pursuing a campaign to \u201ccensor Disney\u2018s and ABC\u2018s speech\u201d with its highly unusual early review of spectrum licenses for eight ABC-owned TV stations.<\/p>\n

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\n\tIn a filing Tuesday with the FCC, the officials \u2014 who served under Republican and Democratic presidents \u2014 urged the current agency to terminate the proceeding. In April, the FCC\u2019s Media Bureau issued\u00a0an unprecedented order\u00a0forcing ABC to reapply for spectrum licenses for its eight owned-and-operated stations on an accelerated schedule. The move came just one day after\u00a0President Donald Trump called for Jimmy Kimmel to be fired\u00a0over a joke the late-night host made about First Lady Melania Trump (Kimmel said Melania had \u201ca\u00a0glow\u00a0like an\u00a0expectant\u00a0widow\u201d). <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis early license renewal proceeding is unprecedented in the history of the Federal Communications Commission and a grave violation of both the Communications Act and the Constitution,\u201d the coalition of officials wrote in the filing. \u201cThrough this proceeding, the FCC seeks to censor Disney\u2019s and ABC\u2019s speech and send a chilling message to all broadcasters: carry speech we don\u2019t like at your peril.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThey continued: \u201cThis renewal proceeding is the latest attack in a sustained campaign by Chairman Carr and the Trump administration of threatening legal sanctions against licensees whose speech President Trump dislikes. And although the purported justification for the early renewal proceeding is that it is in aid of a Commission investigation into unlawful employment discrimination, it is in fact an assault on free speech disguised as regulatory process.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAs former Chairs, Commissioners, Chiefs of Staff, General Counsels and Bureau Chiefs, we call on the Commission to respect the constitutional and congressional prohibitions on its \u2018power of censorship\u2019 and terminate this proceeding,\u201d they wrote.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe officials who signed the filing included Mark Fowler, FCC chairman under President Ronald Reagan; Tom Wheeler, chairman under President Barack Obama; Alfred Sikes, chairman under President George W. Bush; and several high-ranking lawyers and advisers to past agency commissioners.<\/p>\n

\n\tReps for the FCC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe FCC has asserted the early ABC license review is pursuant to the agency\u2019s investigation into Disney and ABC\u2019s potential violations of discrimination rules via the media conglomerate\u2019s diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut the ex-FCC officials said wrote that the \u201cproceeding is pretext for the Chairman\u2019s continued campaign of suppressing disfavored speech.\u201d They said public reporting and the notice establishing the procedures for the proceeding suggest that Carr \u201chas prejudged the outcome of this proceeding and that the Commission may assert the power to terminate the stations\u2019 licenses early.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tIn May, Disney submitted license-renewal applications for the eight ABC stations, which the company said it did \u201cunder protest in response to an unlawful, arbitrary, and unconstitutional order.\u201d Last month, Disney launched a campaign across its stations urging viewers to share comments about the FCC\u2019s proceeding with the agency.<\/p>\n

\n\tTo date, the FCC proceeding seeking comment on ABC\u2019s early license renewal has drawn more than 141,000 comments. The deadline for submitting comments is Aug. 5.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn their filing, the former FCC officials said that two conservative groups that filed comments in the proceeding calling for the agency to deny ABC\u2019s license renewals \u2014 the Center for American Rights and the Media Research Center \u2014 were making requests that \u201care not legitimate subjects of FCC regulation.\u201d The two groups \u201cask the Commission to interfere with the stations\u2019 First Amendment-protected editorial discretion: word choices, fact-checks, time covering certain topics, personnel, and the licensees\u2019 perceived viewpoints,\u201d the officials said.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe CAR and MRC petitions ask the FCC to take actions that are \u201ca stunning \u2014 and plainly unconstitutional \u2014 expansion of the Commission\u2019s role,\u201d the officials said in the filing.<\/p>\n

\n\tCarr last week said the agency will consider ABC\u2019s decision to not carry a live broadcast of Trump\u2019s July 16 speech about U.S. election security as part of its early review of the ABC station licenses. At a press conference, Carr said \u201cI\u2019m sure that there are going to be points raised in that proceeding\u201d about Disney\/ABC\u2019s decision to not air Trump\u2019s speech. \u201cI think that when you have the president of the United States standing inside the White House delivering an important speech, I think that\u2019s something that broadcasters should be carrying,\u201d Carr said.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlso at the FCC press conference, Anna Gomez, the agency\u2019s only Democratic commissioner, pushed back on Carr\u2019s assertion that broadcasters are compelled to carry a president\u2019s speech. \u201cI continue to say that this vague public interest standard is being used just to punish speech that this administration doesn\u2019t like and to reward speech that it does like,\u201d Gomez said. \u201cThat\u2019s inappropriate, and it\u2019s contrary to the law and to the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The FCC and its current chairman, Brendan Carr, were blasted by former heads of the agency and other officials as pursuing a campaign to “censor Disney’s and ABC’s speech” with its highly unusual early review of spectrum licenses for eight ABC-owned TV stations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":911,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[921,1836,923],"class_list":["post-5059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tv","tag-abc","tag-disney-4","tag-fcc-2"],"yoast_head":"\nFCC Slammed by Former Agency Officials Over Review of ABC\u2019s Licenses: \u2018An Assault on Free Speech Disguised as Regulatory Process\u2019 - Relocation Observer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5059\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"FCC Slammed by Former Agency Officials Over Review of ABC\u2019s Licenses: \u2018An Assault on Free Speech Disguised as Regulatory Process\u2019 - 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