The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is reportedly considering revoking CBS's broadcast license after the network aired a controversial interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris on "60 Minutes.” The interview sparked widespread outrage and calls for accountability after the network aired a misleading version, including highly distorted answers from Harris’ responses. According to a lawsuit filed by President Donald Trump, CBS violated state law by demonstrating deceptive acts in business conduct and “doctored” a "word salad" response from the failed Democrat presidential candidate about the Biden administration's involvement in the Israel-Hamas war. The FCC’s review stems from concerns that the interview may have violated broadcasting standards, prompting scrutiny over whether CBS acted in the public interest.
In the past two weeks, FCC Chair Brendan Carr launched investigations into three news outlets and reinstated complaints against three others, including NBC and ABC. The complaint against ABC received a “news distortion” complaint over its fact-checking by the moderators in the presidential debate between Harris and Trump that heavily favored Harris. Meanwhile, the complaint against NBC claimed that Harris’s appearance on “Saturday Night Live,” which aired just weeks before the election, violated “equal time” rules governing political programming.
Former FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel, a Democrat, dismissed any probe into the interview, saying the complaints “seek to weaponize the licensing authority of the FCC in a way that is fundamentally at odds with the First Amendment.”
However, Carr said he doesn’t “see how the FCC can reasonably adjudicate this claim of news distortion without seeing what was actually said.”
Carr's investigation could pave the way for potential revocation of broadcasting licenses for the networks. If the FCC probe uncovers any violations, the agency can impose fines or revoke a station's broadcast license entirely.
He defended his investigation into the networks during an interview with “Fox & Friends.”
“There’s a lot of people in this country right now on the radical left that are upset about this investigation into CBS and the work that I’m doing on broadcasters. And to sort of paraphrase Thomas Sowell, when the government has been weaponized in your favor, it feels like discrimination when all of a sudden there’s even-handed treatment. There’s a lot of people that have been on sort of that upper road of the two-tiered system of government,” he said.
“And what I’m here to do is apply the law evenly. This is a rare situation where we have extrinsic evidence that CBS had played one answer or one set of words and then swapped in another set. And CBS’ conduct through this, frankly, has been concerning.” Carr continued.
After releasing the full, unedited version of Harris’ “60 Minutes” interview, Trump also called for CBS to lose its broadcast license.