FCC chairman Brendan Carr said Thursday that he aims to “re-empower” local TV stations, and he suggested that Congress consider tighter regulations on content moderation processes for social media giants.
Carr spoke at the “Innovation to Restore Trust in News: A National Summit” event hosted by digital news outlet Semafor in Washington, D.C. Ben Smith, Semafor co-founder and editor-in-chief, pressed Carr on what critics fear is Carr’s determination to use the power of the FCC to intimidate the news organizations.
Carr asserted that the FCC in recent decades has backed off of its obligation to ensure that broadcast TV and radio stations operate in the public interest. In his first few weeks in the role of chairman, Carr roiled the journalism world by probing CBS News’ “60 Minutes” and its interview of Vice President Kamala Harris that aired last October. President Donald Trump has a pending lawsuit against CBS, accusing “60 Minutes” of manipulating Harris’ interview to benefit the then-Democratic presidential candidate at his expense. A right-wing law firm also filed a complaint with the FCC against WCBS-TV New York for airing the “60 Minutes” episode. One of Carr’s first acts after becoming FCC chairman was to reinstate the WCBS complaint that had been dismissed along with three others by his predecessor, Biden appointee Jessica Rosenworcel.
Earlier this month, CBS News complied with Carr’s request that it publicly release the full video of its interview sessions with Harris. Given the theme of the conference, Carr stressed that polls show the most Americans have a low level of trust in mainstream media.
“If you look at the national news media, that’s where there’s a lot of lack of trust. But if you separate it to the level that’s actually regulated by the FCC — local broadcasters — people actually trust their local broadcasters. They trust their local journalists. They see them at the post office, at the grocery store. So one thing I’m trying to do is re-empower the local broadcasters to feel like they have the freedom to serve their local communities, because they have these relationships with the national programmers that I don’t think is entirely healthy. So I want to re-empower those local broadcasters to serve the public interest.”
Carr’s remarks raise the specter of the FCC probing the Big Four broadcast networks’ business relationship with their affiliate stations throughout the country. Carr and Smith concurred that there is little consensus on the definition of how broadcasters best serve the public interest
“One thing that’s been the guide-star through the FCC’s public interest standard is localism – serving the needs of your local community. Again, we’ve gotten so much national news media, coming down from these national programmers into the local communities. I think I want to re- empower local news, local sports. I think that’s a good thing.”
Carr was pressed on actions that he’s taken that appear to be targeting outlets that have been roundly criticized by President Trump, including CBS News, NPR and PBS. Carr turned the question around to assert that he’s the one dedicated to restoring objectivity to the FCC.
“We’re coming out of a period, in my view, where there was a lot of weaponization at the FCC. Your last name dictated the FCC treatment,” he said.
Carr cited recent activity by the commission involving an $800 million FCC contract that had been awarded to Elon Musk’s Starlink high-speed internet firm to extend service in rural areas but was revoked. Meanwhile he asserted that billionaire investor George Soros – a frequent target of the far right – had been afforded “a special Soros shortcut” to buy 200 radio stations.
Asked about the extraordinary power that Musk now wields in the Trump administration, Carr asserted the Tesla and SpaceX mega-billionaire will get no special treatment. “If Starlink or Musk is pushing an issue and he’s right 100% of time at the FCC, we’re gonna side with him 100% of the time. If he’s pushing issues, and he’s wrong every single time then he’s gonna lose every single time at the FCC. We’re just gonna give everybody a fair shake.”
Carr sounded the alarm about the influence of social media platforms that have enormous influence but little regulatory oversight compared to broadcast TV and radio stations. Carr’s comments echo complaints from Trump and others that conservatives have been targeted for censorship. More recently with Trump’s return to the White House and Musk’s takeover of Twitter (now known as X), the dynamic has changed for right-wing voices.
“The greatest threat that we have seen over the last several years really has come from large social media companies that have amassed incredible amounts of power. The social media companies got more power over more speech than any institution in history,” Carr said. “What we saw them doing with that power was discriminating against viewpoints, and the government was involved. The government, particularly the Biden administration, was pressuring social media companies to shut down core political speech. … My position is we want more speech, not less.”
Carr cited the “asymmetrical regulatory obligations” imposed on traditional media versus new.
“When you look at Silicon Valley and social media, [they have] lots of power, and I think they used it in discriminatory way,” he said.
