Embroiled in a debate over the authority of the Federal Communications Commission versus Jimmy Kimmel’s perceived right to freely, falsely allege Charlie Kirk’s assassin was not “anything other” than a “MAGA gang” member, FCC Chair Brendan Carr contends the law is on his side.
Carr noted the “public interest standard” and “news distortion” facets of the FCC’s broadcast licenses that local television stations are beholden to – all while reminding his critics the complaint never even got to him or the FCC.
“When it comes to social media, we want wide open, robust debate – very similar on cable – but broadcast TV is just different,” Carr told the Concordia Summit 2025 this week. “It’s got a license, a public interest standard, and Congress has called on the FCC to enforce that.
“If people don’t like it, they can go to Congress and change the law or they can turn their license in.”
In fact, Democrats decrying the local television stations in Sinclair’s markets keeping Kimmel off the airwaves are actually just “projecting” on something they once attempted to force the FCC to do under former President Joe Biden.
“Some of the very same Democrats that are distorting what happened here actually did the thing that they say happened in this instance,” Carr reminded in this lengthy rebuke of “news distortion” and “projection” to Concordia.
“We saw a whole raft of that weaponization during the Biden years. In fact, during the Biden FCC there was an unprecedented period of time, ’21-’22-’23-’24, where the FCC didn’t renew virtually any license for Sinclair. That had never happened before.
“You had members of Congress write letters to cable companies pressuring them to drop Fox News, OAN, and Newsmax because they believed they were right-wing outlets.”
But this Kimmel case is not only fundamentally different, but justified by the law as laid out by Congress in authorizing the FCC to regulate the U.S. broadcast airwaves, according to Carr.
“Broadcast television is fundamentally different than other forms of communication, including cable news and podcasts and people that sit there on their soapbox,” Carr said in his lengthy explainer. “What happens at the FCC is you have a broadcast license, there’s conditions. There’s a public interest standard, which means you have to operate consistent to the public interest.
“And one of the things the FCC has in our case law and our precedent is this concept of a news distortion complaint.”
ABC/Disney are “not licensed by the FCC” and “have no public interest obligation,” Carr noted – dispelling claims the FCC was unduly pressuring moderation of Kimmel’s speech – but reminding misinformed critics it was the actions of the licensed local stations finally standing up against the pressures of its billionaire programmers above.
“When concerns are raised about news distortion there’s a way, an easy way, for parties to address that and work that out,” Carr continued.
“And in the main that takes place between local television stations that are licensed by the FCC and what we call national programmers like Disney. They work that out and there doesn’t need to be any involvement of the FCC.
If they don’t, there’s a way that’s not as easy, which is someone can file a complaint and then the FCC, by law, as set up by Congress, has to adjudicate that complaint.”
Notably, Carr reminded his critics, this Kimmel case never brought the complaint for the FCC to weigh in on, because local television stations finally felt empowered against the big programmers – most decidedly woke and liberally biased.
“The FCC and myself in particular have expressed no view on the ultimate merits had something like that been filed – what our take would be one way or the other,” Carr said.
“What we’re trying to do at the FCC is to empower local TV stations to serve the needs of the local communities.”
This case is not one of suppression of Kimmel’s speech, but actually democracy at work in delivering power to the masses against the billionaire interests, according to Carr.
“National programmers have exerted more and more control and pressure on the local TV stations,” Carr warned. “They don’t feel as if they can push back on the national programmers even when they think that there’s some content that they don’t think in their judgment – not my judgment but their judgment – makes sense for the local communities.
“The local TV stations for the first time in a long time stood up and said we don’t want to run that program at least right now.”
Carr’s comments came before Kimmel’s return on non-Sinclair stations, but Kimmel continued to fundamentally fail to understand broadcast law, FCC regulations, “public interest standards,” and “news distortion” by continuing to defame the FCC and Carr.
“Brendan Carr is the most embarrassing car Republicans have embraced since this one, and that’s saying something,” Kimmel said, while showing a picture of a red, white, and blue Cybertruck with “Trump” painted on it.
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