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Following the controversial suspension of Jimmy Kimmel from ABC, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr has reportedly turned his regulatory attention towards ABC’s popular talk show, The View, alongside NBC’s late-night hosts Seth Meyers and Jimmy Fallon.
Carr’s remarks emerged during an interview with radio host Scott Jennings, who probed the FCC Chairman on whether programs like The View might be flouting FCC regulations. Jennings also referenced former President Donald Trump’s past calls for NBC to cancel Fallon and Meyers, suggesting that some shows on ABC could be violating rules “more often than Jimmy Kimmel.”
“A lot of people think there are other shows on ABC that maybe run afoul of this more often than Jimmy Kimmel,” Jennings stated. “I’m thinking specifically of The View, and President Trump himself has mentioned Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers at NBC. Do you have comments on those shows, and are they doing what Kimmel did Monday night, and is it even worse on those programs in your opinion?”
In response, Carr cited the FCC’s Equal Opportunities Rule, often known as the “Equal Time Rule.” He hinted that the FCC could potentially rule that these shows no longer qualify for an exemption to this crucial regulation.
“When you look at these other TV shows, what’s interesting is the FCC does have a rule called the Equal Opportunity Rule, which means, for instance, if you’re in the run-up to an election and you have one partisan elected official on, you have to give equal time, equal opportunity, to the opposing partisan politician,” Carr explained.
Later in the discussion, Carr delivered a stark warning to broadcasters who might object to the FCC’s enforcement efforts: “Turn your license in to the FCC, we’ll find something else to do with it.”
The Bona Fide News Exemption Under Scrutiny
Carr clarified that the FCC has traditionally not enforced the Equal Opportunity Rule on such programs due to a “bona fide news” exemption. However, he suggested this interpretation might be reconsidered for the shows mentioned by Jennings:
There’s an exception to that rule called the bona fide news exception, which means if you are a bona fide news program, you don’t have to abide by the Equal Opportunity Rule. Over the years, the FCC has developed a body of case law on that that has suggested that most of these late night shows, other than SNL, are bona fide news programs. I would assume you could make the argument that The View is a bona fide news show but I’m not so sure about that, and I think it’s worthwhile to have the FCC look into whether The View and some of these other programs you have still qualify as bona fide news programs and [are] therefore exempt from the Equal Opportunity regime that Congress has put in place.
The Equal Opportunity Rule governs radio and TV broadcast stations holding FCC licenses. It mandates that stations granting airtime to one political candidate must provide “comparable time and placement to opposing candidates” if requested. The onus remains on the candidates to make such requests.
The “bona fide news” exemption allows legally qualified candidates to appear on newscasts, interview programs, certain documentaries, and during live coverage of news events without triggering the Equal Opportunities Rule. This exemption was established by Congress in 1994 to foster increased news coverage of political campaigns, granting the FCC discretion in its interpretation.
Historically, the FCC has focused on whether a program “reports news of some area of current events… in a manner similar to more traditional newscasts,” deferring to a broadcaster’s “good faith news judgment,” as outlined in a 1988 ruling regarding Entertainment Tonight and Entertainment This Week.
Carr’s Past Allegations and Current Controversies
In November 2024, Carr previously alleged that NBC’s decision to feature Kamala Harris on Saturday Night Live before the election was “a clear and blatant effort to evade the FCC’s Equal Time rule.” However, NBC reportedly complied with the rule by offering two free 60-second messages to Donald Trump.
Notably, Carr has not cited specific incidents on The View or late-night shows that would violate the FCC rule. Producers for The View have stated they invited Trump to appear in both the 2016 and 2020 election cycles, but he declined, leading them to cease invitations. “I think he’s pretty familiar with how the co-hosts feel about him and doesn’t see himself coming here,” Executive Producer Brian Teta told Deadline in April 2024.
The recent controversy involving Jimmy Kimmel erupted over a monologue where he criticized the “MAGA gang” for attempts to politicize a murder case, particularly regarding the accused’s alleged liberal views. Carr and other conservatives accused Kimmel of misleading viewers. On right-wing commentator Benny Johnson’s podcast, Carr warned, “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct, to take action, frankly on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”
Major TV station owners, Nexstar and Sinclair, subsequently urged ABC to take action against Kimmel, with some stations refusing to air his show. This pressure coincided with both Nexstar and ABC owner Disney seeking approval for mergers from the Trump administration.
Democrats Accuse Carr of First Amendment Hypocrisy
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez, the sole Democrat on the Republican-majority commission, criticized Carr’s actions, calling them an overstep of authority. She highlighted how “billion-dollar companies with pending business before the agency” are “vulnerable to pressure to bend to the government’s ideological demands.”
Democratic lawmakers echoed Gomez’s concerns, proposing investigations into Carr for abuse of authority. “It is not simply unacceptable for the FCC chairman to threaten a media organization because he does not like the content of its programming—it violates the First Amendment that you claim to champion,” Senate Democrats wrote in a letter to Carr. They accused the FCC, under Carr’s leadership, of being “weaponized to do precisely that.”
Democrats pointed to Carr’s past statements where he condemned government censorship, including during his 2023 re-confirmation hearings, where he equated Democratic censorship efforts to those “you’d see in the Soviet Union.” In 2019, Carr tweeted, “Should the government censor speech it doesn’t like? Of course not. The FCC does not have a roving mandate to police speech in the name of the ‘public interest.'” Even Republican Sen. Ted Cruz voiced concerns, warning that such tactics could be used against Republicans if Democrats were in power.
Carr’s Stance on Broadcaster Accountability
Carr maintained that his focus remains solely on licensed broadcasters, which carry public-interest obligations, unlike cable and streaming services. While network programming itself doesn’t require an FCC license, the local TV stations that broadcast network shows do.
He attempted to portray Kimmel’s suspension as a result of “organic pressure” from licensed broadcasters, rather than direct FCC coercion. “There’s no untoward coercion happening here,” Carr told Jennings. “The market was intended to function this way, where local TV stations get to push back.” However, Carr had previously urged TV station owners to “step up and say this garbage isn’t something that we think serves the needs of our local communities,” referring to Kimmel’s monologue as “some of the sickest conduct possible.”
On the Jennings show, Carr alleged that the previous administration implemented “a two-tiered weaponized system of justice,” claiming his FCC is offering “a fair shake and even-handed treatment.”
Carr has also repeatedly invoked the FCC’s rarely enforced “news distortion policy,” which he referred to as a “rule” on the Jennings show. “We do have those rules at the FCC: If you engage in news distortion, we can take action,” Carr asserted. While legally challenging for the FCC to revoke licenses based on news distortion, Carr’s public statements exert significant pressure on networks and broadcasters.
He reiterated his ultimatum to broadcasters:
If you’re a broadcaster and you don’t like being held accountable for the first time in a long time through the public interest standard, that’s fine. You can turn your license in to the FCC, we’ll find something else to do with it. Or you can go to Congress and say, ‘I don’t want the FCC having public interest obligations on broadcasters anymore, I want broadcasters to be like cable, to be like a streaming service.’ That’s fine too. But as long as that’s the system that Congress has created, we’re going to enforce it.