Days after Disney fired back at Donald Trump‘s FCC commissioner’s threats to reconsider the company’s broadcast licenses for ABC, the network is now taking action to oppose the administration’s targeting of The View for the so-called “equal time” rule.
As detailed by Variety, ABC has filed a petition to oppose the FCC’s order for one of its affiliates to formally ask for a decision as to whether the daytime talk show qualifies for the news exception to the “equal time” rule for candidate interviews.
In a discharge petition, the network wrote, “The Commission’s order to file this Petition for Declaratory Ruling is unprecedented, beyond the Commission’s authority, and counterproductive to the Commission’s stated goal of encouraging free speech and open political discussion. The Commission’s actions threaten to upend decades of settled law and practice and chill critical protected speech, both with respect to The View and more broadly.”
The claim continued, “The View has been broadcasting under a bona fide news exemption granted to it more than 20 years ago, consistent with longstanding Commission interpretations designed to minimize the serious First Amendment problems inherent in the equal time regime. The View‘s exemption remains valid, and the constitutional infirmities in the equal time doctrine are even more pronounced today, when the broadcast airwaves account for a slice of the numerous media options through which Americans get their political information. Indeed, the marketplace of ideas has never been more robust, and people can hear virtually any brand of political commentary by listening to a podcast, watching cable, scrolling social media, or streaming on a phone, computer, or connected TV. The free flow of ideas flourishes on these non-broadcast platforms, even though the equal opportunities rule does not apply there.”
ABC added that to uphold the restriction on The View “would risk restricting political discourse exactly when it is needed most.”
FCC head Brendan Carr indicated he was going after The View through the agency months ago, even before the commission formally issued new guidance about the equal time rule. On April 28, the administration also ordered Disney’s ABC to “file license renewals for all of their licensed TV stations within 30 days.” The challenge was said to be related to the FCC’s ongoing probe of Disney’s diversity, equity, and inclusion hiring initiatives.
In response to that order, which came days after Trump publicly called for Jimmy Kimmel to be fired by the network for a joke he made about Melania Trump in his faux White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech, Disney issued a statement, saying, “We have received the Federal Communications Commission’s order initiating an accelerated review of the licenses held by ABC’s owned television stations. ABC and its stations have a long record of operating in full compliance with FCC rules and serving their local communities with trusted news, emergency information, and public‑interest programming.”
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