FCC won’t review how broadcasts report virus
Post-Gazette Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — The Federal Communications Commission on Monday rejected a petition that had called for an investigation into how broadcasters treat comments about the COVID-19 pandemic, including those from White House press briefings.
The commission’s chairman, Ajit Pai, announced in a statement he was standing “firmly in defense of Americans’ First Amendment freedoms.”
“The federal government will not — and never should — investigate broadcasters for their editorial judgments simply because a special interest group is angry at the views being expressed on the air as well as those expressing them,” Mr. Pai wrote.
“In short, we will not censor the news,” Mr. Pai stated. “Instead, consistent with the First Amendment, we leave it to broadcasters to determine for themselves how to cover this national emergency, including live events involving our nation’s leaders.”
The petition, filed two weeks ago by the media advocacy group Free Press, asked the commission to issue guidance under its authority to police broadcasters that deliberately air “hoaxes” or false information that causes widespread public harm.
Free Press’ filing cataloged a number of instances that President Donald Trump downplayed the COVID-19 pandemic and that on-air personalities, including KDKA Radio’s Wendy Bell, suggested the health concerns were overblown by the media.
“The FCC must ensure that broadcasters are proactively protecting the health and safety of Americans and use its powers to make sure that the public receives accurate information about this deadly pandemic,” the petition stated, pointing out other agencies, like the Federal Trade Commission, the U.S. Department of Justice and the Food and Drug Administration have issued consumer protection guidance.
The FCC’s Office of General Counsel and Media Bureau “wholly rejected” the petition, which seeks remedies that “dangerously curtail the freedom of the press” and cast the commission as a “roving arbiter of broadcasters’ editorial judgments.”
Last week, one Republican commissioner had previewed the commission’s decision in sharp terms.
“This is a sweeping and dangerous attempt by the left to weaponize the FCC against conservative broadcasters and politicians,” Brendan Carr, a Trump appointee confirmed by the Senate in 2017, tweeted.
“And it is a clear signal of the agenda the left will pursue if they regain control of the FCC,” Mr. Carr added. “Censoring speech that does not fit their orthodoxy.”
The FCC did not respond to a request for comment on Mr. Carr’s tweets.