Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr states he will not ditch the company’s questionable news distortion policy regardless of calls from a bipartisan group of previous FCC chairs and commissioners.

“How about no,” Carr composed in an X post in reaction to the petition from previous FCC leaders. “On my watch, the FCC will continue to hold broadcasters responsible to their public interest commitments.”

The petition submitted the other day by previous FCC chairs and commissioners asked the FCC to reverse its 1960s-era news distortion policy, which Carr has actually consistently conjured up in hazards to withdraw broadcast licenses. In the current Jimmy Kimmel debate, Carr stated that ABC affiliates might have licenses withdrawed for news distortion if they kept the comic on the air.

The petition stated the Kimmel occurrence and a number of other Carr risks highlight “the remarkable invasions on editorial decision-making that Chairman Carr obviously comprehends the news distortion policy to allow.” The petition argued that the “policy’s function– to remove predisposition in the news– is not a genuine federal government interest,” that it has actually cooled broadcasters’ speech, that it has actually been weaponized for partisan functions, that it is extremely unclear, and is unneeded provided the different guideline versus broadcast scams.

“The news distortion policy is no longer sensible under today’s First Amendment teaching and no longer required in today’s media environment … The Commission ought to reverse the policy completely and acknowledge that it might not examine or punish broadcasters for ‘misshaping,’ ‘slanting,’ or ‘staging’ the news, unless the broadcast at concern separately satisfies the high requirement for transmitting a hazardous scam under 47 C.F.R. § 73.1217,” the petition stated.

News distortion policy hardly ever implemented

The petition was submitted by Mark Fowler, a Republican who chaired the FCC from 1981 to 1987; Dennis Patrick, a Republican who chaired the FCC from 1987 to 1989; Alfred Sikes, a Republican who chaired the FCC from 1989 to 1993; Tom Wheeler, a Democrat who chaired the FCC from 2013 to 2017; Andrew Barrett, a Republican who functioned as a commissioner from 1989 to 1996; Ervin Duggan, a Democrat who functioned as a commissioner from 1990 to 1994; and Rachelle Chong, a Republican who acted as a commissioner from 1994 to 1997.