ABC Says FCC Is Hanging Death Threat For Broadcasters

ABC on Thursday opposed the Federal Communications Commission’s bid to dismiss its First Amendment lawsuit, arguing that the agency’s early license-renewal review of eight Disney-owned stations is a “broadcaster death penalty” meant to punish the network’s speech.

In a filing meeting a Sept. 17 reply deadline, ABC said the FCC’s “plain purpose” in opening the process was to gain leverage “by hanging the threat of the broadcaster death penalty of license non-renewal or revocation over Plaintiffs’ every editorial decision.”

 The network accused the commission of trying “to license viewpoints,” not investigate discrimination, and said the government’s motion “improperly conflate[s] the nature of Plaintiffs’ retaliation claims” while ABC and its affiliates suffer.“

Although the Chairman is free to express publicly that he dislikes Jimmy Kimmel or thinks that no one should watch ‘The View,’ he cannot threaten retaliatory enforcement against speech he dislikes. Such threats indisputably qualify as adverse action,” the filing said.

The FCC on Sept. 4 asked a federal judge to dismiss the suit challenging the early review of licenses for the eight stations. Briefing is set under a schedule the court issued last month, with a hearing ordered for the week of Oct. 5.

Separately Thursday, a bipartisan group of 18 former FCC chairmen, commissioners and officials filed a brief supporting ABC. They said Chairman Brendan Carr violated the First Amendment “in plain view” and that his “broad threats and ominous warnings to the entire media ecosystem” created a regime in which “any broadcaster, including ABC, can be found guilty of transgressions at any time for seemingly any thing.”