President-elect Trump’s nomination of Brendan Carr as the following chairman of the Federal Communications Fee is bringing each hope and concern to the media trade.
For media executives, the hope comes within the promise of trade consolidation.
Corporations similar to Fox Tv Stations, Nexstar Media Group, Tegna and Grey Media are keen to purchase extra TV stations to raised compete towards deep-pocketed tech companies which can be aggressively pursuing viewers and advert {dollars}. Carr is anticipated to help revisiting the rule on possession of TV stations.
Brendan Carr solutions questions throughout a Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee listening to in June 2020.
(Jonathan Newton / Related Press)
The trepidation comes from Carr’s open criticism of broadcasters and tech companies on behalf of Trump, who’s famously hostile to journalists and retailers that criticize him. Carr, a Republican nominated to the FCC throughout Trump’s first time period in 2017 and once more by President Biden in 2023, wrote the chapter on the FCC within the conservative coverage blueprint Undertaking 2025.
In the course of the election, he jumped on social media when Vice President Kamala Harris appeared on the Nov. 2 episode of NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” to level out that the community additionally owed an invite to Trump beneath the FCC’s equal time provision.
NBC obliged, giving Trump time on the finish of a NASCAR race and following “Sunday Night Football.” (Carr additionally acquired a public word from NBC mother or father Comcast congratulating him on his nomination.)
A consultant for CBS had no touch upon Carr’s remarks.
Large media firms are bracing for the likelihood that he’ll do Trump’s bidding when the president-elect threatens retribution towards media retailers which can be unfriendly to him.
Whereas the FCC is an unbiased company that’s overseen by Congress, Trump has prompt he desires to convey it beneath tighter White Home management. In the course of the marketing campaign, Trump referred to as for the company to drag the printed licenses held by ABC, NBC and CBS as a result of he was sad with their protection.
Carr lately mentioned on X that he’ll make sure the FCC “will enforce” legal guidelines that decision on broadcasters “to operate in the public interest.”
One station govt, who was not licensed to remark publicly, mentioned there’s lively exploration inside Trump’s orbit about how the brand new administration ought to reply to the president-elect’s perception that the media handled him unfairly through the marketing campaign.
(Some journalists are taking Trump’s threats significantly. MSNBC hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski — former Trump associates who turned harsh critics of his presidency and habits — visited the president-elect at Mar-a-Lago to reestablish a relationship with him.)
However Jeffrey McCall, a media research professor at DePauw College, thinks Carr’s remarks are “saber rattling” and doubts that the nominee would use the fee’s management over the general public airwaves as a political weapon.
“I have a hard time believing that you could hold up some sort of merger because of what ’60 Minutes’ did in one broadcast over one interview,” McCall mentioned.
McCall mentioned Carr is “savvy enough to know that he can say, ‘I’ll take it into consideration.’” However he doesn’t see the commissioner punishing an organization over an editorial determination.
Broadcast executives are inspired that Carr is looking for higher regulation of the tech trade, which he outlines in a chapter he wrote for Undertaking 2025. Carr desires tech firms to be extra clear about their algorithm modifications and their choices to dam or demonetize customers.
“We must dismantle the censorship cartel and restore free speech rights for everyday Americans,” Carr wrote on X after Trump appointed him.
The stations imagine they’re at an obstacle in having to following laws not imposed on their digital rivals.
Station possession guidelines additionally hamper broadcasters as they attempt to compete with tech companies which can be coming after extra TV viewers and promoting {dollars}. The present rule says firms can personal broadcast TV stations that attain not more than 39% of U.S. properties. The restrict was set in 2004, years earlier than streaming video began consuming away at conventional TV’s viewers share.
Media executives see this restrict as antiquated in an age by which many customers are fleeing conventional tv for streaming.