Nexstar‘s WPIX in New York and NewsNation are among the TV properties that can no longer be seen on cable systems owned by Altice, in the latest carriage dispute to erupt in the industry.
Nexstar said Friday that 63 of its local TV stations had gone dark in 42 markets around the U.S. as a result of a contract disagreement. Altice had around 2.03 million pay-TV subscribers in the third quarter of 2024.
“Altice has consistently made unreasonable and unprecedented demands of Nexstar, culminating with their decision to walk away from the negotiations,” said Michael Biard, Nexstar’s president and chief operating officer. “We understand the difficulty of Altice’s financial situation, burdened as it is by billions in debt, but the solution isn’t to force Optimum subscribers to continually pay more while getting less.”
Altice said it had offered an interim extension while negotiations continued, but was turned down by Nexstar.
“Unfortunately, Nexstar is using an anti-consumer negotiation tactic – tying local channels to less popular ones – requiring Optimum and its customers to pay for channels like NewsNation, which has essentially no viewership, in order to continue carrying Nexstar broadcast stations in various markets across the country,” Altice said in a statement.
Altice, which counts key cable systems in New York as part of its Optimum service, is also in a carriage dispute with MSG Networks, led by James L. Dolan, whose family used to operate Cablevision, which Altice purchased in 2015 for $17.7 billion. Altice USA is based in Long Island, New York.
Nexstar said it has been in what it called “good faith negotiations” with Altice since October, but indicated the carrier had demanded “special terms that are wildly out of step with both our longstanding relationship and the cable television marketplace.” Disputes between carriers and media companies and station owners have become more common in recent years as subscribers shift away from traditional TV and adopt streaming services in its place.
Altice serves several communities in and around the New York metropolitan area as well as in the southern and midwestern U.S.
