President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming chair of the Federal Communications Commission, Brendan Carr, sent a letter to Disney CEO Bob Iger, promising to hold the company accountable for prioritizing its content over others that may be more trusted by the American people.
“Dear Mr. Iger, Americans no longer trust the national news media to report fully, accurately, and fairly,” Carr’s letter, obtained by CNN, said.
“ABC’s own conduct has certainly contributed to this erosion in public trust,” Carr wrote, explaining that ABC News, owned by Disney, “recently agreed to pay $15 million to President Trump’s future presidential foundation and museum and an additional $1 million in attorney fees to settle a defamation case.”
The controversy stemmed from Stephanopoulos’ repeated claims during the interview that Trump had been “found liable for rape,” a misstatement related to the outcome of a civil trial involving E. Jean Carroll.
“The approach that ABC is apparently taking in these negotiations concerns me,” Carr added. “My understanding is that ABC is attempting to extract onerous financial and operational concessions from local broadcast TV stations under the threat of terminating long-held affiliations, which could result in blackouts and other harms to local consumers of broadcast news and content.”
He further expressed concerns that Disney may prioritize its streaming services over content available to local news outlets.
“The fact that a massive trust divide has emerged between local news outlets and national programmers like ABC only increases the importance of retransmission consent revenues remaining available for local broadcast TV stations to invest in their local news operations and content that serves their communities,” he wrote.
The letter concluded with Carr stating that he would monitor ABC’s negotiations to ensure they “enable local broadcast TV stations to meet their federal obligations and serve the needs of their local communities.”
