Selective application of 'equal time' obviously violates the 1st A

Fox News admitted under oath that they are fake news, so Carr needs to target them or drop the ruse

The pattern is clear: Corporate billionaires who either own or are purchasing U.S. media are censoring content to support Trump. Trump’s blatantly illegal carrot is the conditioning of federal contracts, mergers, licensing, tax and regulatory relief on partisan fealty. His stick? Threatening the FCC licensesof networks that criticize him.

In January, singling out left-leaning shows like SNL, The View, Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert, Trump’s FCC Chairman Brendan Carr resurrected a long dormant “equal time” policy to issue new regulatory guidance requiring these shows to give ‘equal time’ to political candidates in an election period. The rule was originally adopted in 1934, but the talk shows Carr is now targeting had been exempted under a ‘news’ exemption since 1959.

Carr, despite declaring that the new regulations apply to shows “motivated by partisan purposes,” is not applying them to Fox News, a blended news and entertainment network that runs 24/7 Trump propaganda. Nor is he applying them to Sinclair-owned right wing talk radio, which the FCC also regulates, reaching 40% of the nation’s voters on an hourly basis.

Instead, Carr is only focusing on what he calls ‘left-leaning’ entertainment programming.

Who is Carr fooling? Republicans hate fairness in the news

If Carr were really trying to level the media playing field, he’d be dusting off the Fairness Doctrine, forming a bipartisan committee to discuss how to refurbish it for today’s news environment. ‘Equal time’ rules track with the Fairness Doctrine, which required, when a political opinion was aired, that both sides be presented. The Fairness doctrine was repealed under Reagan in 1987, and our country has grown more divided ever since.

The irony in watching Carr resurrect ‘fairness’ today is that Republicans have long opposed fairness in the media. The Heritage Foundation railed against the Fairness Doctrine in 1993, arguing that requiring both sides of a political argument violated free speech.

Watching Carr now apply ‘equal time’ to left leaning talk shows while exempting right wing views makes a mockery of fairness principles that drove the law in the first place.

Trump’s FCC is mocking Equal Time by applying it unequally

Selective application of federal communication rules based on partisan leanings so obviously violates the First Amendment it merits little discussion. It’s the textbook definition the Supreme Court has operated under since 1963:

Under the first amendment, “the government cannot punish or suppress speakers based on their viewpoints or political content.”

While networks could and very likely will sue the FCC on First Amendment and misuse of authority grounds, whether the Roberts court will rule in time for it to matter is an open question.

Whether CBS was directed to pull the Colbert/Talarico interview or bent the knee in advance has been the subject of debate, but it doesn’t matter. Carr made his illegal intentions clear, saying, “If you’re ‘fake news,’ you’re not going to qualify” for an exception to the equal time rules.

Someone will soon throw these words back at him, reminding Carr that the owner of Fox News admitted under oath that it’s fake news. It lied, got caught, and fessed up. Fox is an entertainment network; Carr must either include them in his new ‘rule,’ or drop the farce.

The UK requires fairness and accuracy in the news. Its public discourse is more intelligent as a result.

The equal opportunity section (315) of the Communications Act of 1934 and the Fairness Doctrine were good ideas; letting Republicans trash them left us less informed as a nation, and perhaps that was the goal.

Grotesquely biased news media shows today in our dumbed-down, third-grade level political discourse. It’s why 77 million Americans voted for a charlatan who speaks like a child, who now has access to the nuclear codes.

If you need convincing, watch a debate in the UK parliament, where Parliamentarians discuss complicated topics, and actually address details. They hold nuance. It isn’t because they’re smarter, it’s because in the UK, news accuracy is strictly regulated. The UK’s Office of Communications mandates “due accuracy” and impartiality in television and radio news, and they enforce it. In result, Brits are far better informed than we are, and they expect policy debates with substance.

Every time I write about the Fairness Doctrine, readers come back with, ‘you’re trying to censor,’ or, ‘you want the government to tell us what’s fair?’ Yes, yes I do. A fully bipartisan committee that understands the importance of accuracy in the news is the medicine that will help cure us. How can we blame 40% of the country for continuing to support a murderer, when they have never seen the evidence against him?

Fox News and Sinclair-owned right wing media are why the rest of the world holds their leaders to account, while ours molest children, murder innocent people, and line their own pockets with inglorious impunity.

Sabrina Haake is a columnist and 25+ year federal trial attorney specializing in 1^st and 14^th A defense. Her Substack, The Haake Take, is free.