ABC, which is owned by Disney, has filed a lawsuit against the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), accusing the regulator of illegally trying to challenge broadcast licenses and interfere with the work of television stations over the content of their programs, the Wall Street Journal reports. Previously, the FCC ordered eight Disney stations to submit license renewal documents ahead of schedule.
The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in federal court in Washington. In parallel, ABC appealed to the D.C. Court of Appeals. In the case materials, the channel calls the FCC’s actions a “campaign of retaliation” that the Donald Trump administration launched allegedly due to dissatisfaction with the content of the broadcast.
“The administration has time and again attacked ABC’s statements—the materials produced by the channel’s journalists and the opinions voiced in its programs. Over time, these attacks escalated into direct demands to deprive ABC of its broadcast licenses precisely because of the content of its broadcast,” the lawsuit says.
As RTVI reported, in April the FCC ordered ABC to begin the license renewal procedure ahead of schedule. The commission's order said ABC and Disney may be violating provisions of the Communications Act of 1934 and FCC rules, including the agency's prohibition on unlawful discrimination. The regulator required eight Disney-owned stations to submit paperwork to renew their licenses, even though their licenses were not due to expire until 2028.
“The Commission issued an unprecedented order requiring stations to submit license renewal applications early—several years before those licenses would normally have expired—and gave them only 30 days to prepare documents that would normally take months,” the lawsuit states.
The channel's management believes that the audit was actually a reaction to statements made on ABC programs, in particular on the evening show Jimmy Kimmel Live and the daytime talk show The View.
Thus, the audit was launched the day after Trump called on the company to fire comedian and TV host Jimmy Kimmel for a joke about the first lady on his evening show. As part of the sketch, Kimmel appeared as the host of a media dinner party. One of Kimmel's remarks was addressed to Melania Trump – the comedian noted that the first lady “shines like a future widow.”
After this, Melania said that the TV presenter was “hiding behind ABC because he knows that the channel will continue to cover for him” and called on the channel to “take a principled stand.” Trump, in turn, called the TV presenter’s words “really shocking” and demanded the comedian’s dismissal.
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr told CNBC at the time that the commission's focus was on Disney's policies on diversity, equity and inclusion, and the decision to renew licenses early was not related to the statements of the network's hosts.
Such checks and cases of revocation of broadcast licenses are extremely rare, the Wall Street Journal notes. In 1969, regulators revoked the license of a station in Jackson, Mississippi, that advocated racial segregation in its programming. In 1980, the FCC also revoked the licenses of the media company RKO due to violations in the conduct of business and the provision of false information to the regulator about its activities.
