Complaints Against Network-Owned Stations Reinstated
The FCC Media Bureau and Enforcement Bureau have set aside decisions made last week under the previous FCC chair to dismiss complaints against stations owned by ABC, CBS and NBC, according to orders filed in docket 25-11 Wednesday.
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“We find that the previous order was issued prematurely based on an insufficient investigatory record for the station-specific conduct at issue,” said the three nearly identical orders, two of which acting EB chief Patrick Webre signed and one that acting MB chief Erin Boone signed. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr announced the new posts for Boone and Webre earlier Wednesday. “We therefore conclude that this complaint requires further consideration.” The orders cited FCC rules allowing the agency to set aside its decisions on its own motion within 30 days.
A fourth complaint dismissed by then-Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel’s FCC, against a Fox station, wasn’t resurrected, according to industry officials and the FCC’s License Management System, which still showed the license renewal of WTXF Philadelphia as “granted” Wednesday. NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox didn’t comment
"We cannot allow our licensing authority to be weaponized to curtail freedom of the press," FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez said in a release Wednesday protesting the reinstatement of the complaints. "The First Amendment is a pillar of American democracy, and our country needs a press free from interference from regulators like me. In fact, the Communications Act explicitly prohibits the Commission from censoring broadcasters."
ABC, NBC and CBS could challenge the decision to reinstate the complaints with petitions for reconsideration but aren't expected to do so because such a challenge would be unlikely to lead to a reversal, attorneys told us. The Center for American Rights, the nonprofit behind all three reinstated complaints, told us Wednesday it hadn’t received official correspondence from the FCC about them being restored. "These are serious issues that deserve real resolution,” CAR President Daniel Suhr said in an emailed statement. “The prior chair’s last-minute actions were political, not based on a principled defense of the First Amendment. Free speech does not include blatantly distorting the news or violating longstanding commission rules." Said former Fox and Disney executive Preston Padden: “Curiously, he is not reinstating the one complaint based on multiple judicial findings -- the complaint against the Murdochs and Fox.” Padden supported the Media and Democracy Project’s complaint against WTXF.