Media Matters: ABC fights back, finally

ABC recently sued the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The network, owned by Disney, says that the FCC’s “efforts to challenge its broadcast licenses and regulate its talk show ‘The View’ are illegal and an effort to quash speech the Trump administration finds objectionable,” according to The Wall Street Journal.  

ABC owns eight local broadcast stations, most in major cities like New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. These licenses are up for renewal every eight years, but in an unprecedented move, the FCC is making ABC go through the renewal process earlier.

Some history about owning a broadcast station: For 31 years, the FCC enforced the 7-7-7 rule. The agency mandated that a single company could not own more than seven TV stations, seven AM radio stations, and seven FM radio stations – and not more than one in the same market (except for several grandfathered situations in some major cities).

The 7-7-7 rule, in place from 1953-1984, became the 12-12-12 rule in 1984. When the Telecommunications Act of 1996 passed, most ownership rules fell away and the deregulation of the broadcast industry began. The quaint idea behind the old rules was to diversify ownership in the marketplace. When radio emerged in the 1920s, broadcast frequencies were considered a scarce resource that crossed state boundaries – i.e., any regional market could accommodate only so many signals before they interfered with other radio and TV signals. So, Congress invented the Federal Radio Commission (FRC), which became the FCC in 1934, to sort out frequency interference and license broadcasters, mandated to use their licenses in the public interest.

Fast forward to 2026, when iHeartMedia owns over 860 radio stations; Nexstar owns 265 TV stations in 44 states; Sinclair owns 177 TV stations; Fox owns 29; CBS/Paramount Skydance owns 15; NBC/Comcast owns 12 and ABC/Disney owns eight. In addition, each TV network today has over 200 affiliates in the TV markets that carry that network’s national programs. Networks do not own their affiliated stations.  

Radio and TV broadcasters go through a license renewal process every eight years. No network-owned TV station has ever lost a license. The last time the FCC revoked a license over a station's programming was in 1969, when a Jackson, MS station lost its license “for defending segregation on the air.” 

A lot has changed. In fact, in 2025, for the first time, more U.S. households watched TV through streaming services (47%) than on traditional network TV (21%) or cable channels like CNN or ESPN (20%). Via the internet, broadcast and cable channels are now available through streaming services like Hulu and YouTube.  

So where am I going with all this? Well, I am a TV nerd, fascinated that after capitulating multiple times in high profile cases, ABC/Disney has finally sued the FCC for its unprecedented action, calling for early license renewal reviews for its eight TV stations. 

ABC had had enough. The suit says the FCC has violated the network’s First Amendment rights on multiple occasions.

First, Fortune magazine noted last year that the call for early renewal “came shortly after a joke by ABC’s late-night host Jimmy Kimmel – an outspoken Trump critic – had infuriated the president,” who called for Kimmel’s firing at the time. Yet, the FCC “cited the network’s diversity and inclusion practices” as the reason for the early renewal process. ABC removed Kimmel from the show for six days. 

Second, the FCC targeted ABC’s long-running morning talk show “The View.” After a Texas Democrat running for Senate appeared as a guest, “the FCC opened an investigation into possible violations of a rule that entertainment shows must provide an opportunity for opposing political candidates to request equal time. ‘The View’ has long argued that it’s ‘a bona fide’ news program, and therefore exempt from that requirement, which the FCC had formally recognized for two decades,” according to the Columbia Journalism Review.

Finally, in July President Trump announced a prime-time address to the nation. As CJR reported, “ABC decided not to broadcast the address live – but because the network ‘was aware that the President wanted the address to be broadcast live, and considered the risk of resulting Administration retaliation,’” ABC decided to air the speech on its livestream service, “which it ordinarily would not have done.”  

The federal government is prohibited from censoring broadcast speech. So to get around that, FCC chairman Brendam Carr has said the early license review “isn’t about speech but rather about the company’s DEI initiatives” –  i.e., ABC/Disney’s diversity-equity-inclusion practices.     

To fulfill FCC demands the network has supplied “13,000 pages of documents in response to some 600 requests.” ABC said the federal agency has asked for “communications between producers and hosts on ‘The View’... as well as an itemized list of political donations from some employees, including in its news division,” the New York Times reported.

A federal court hearing to stop the FCC’s investigation is set for October.

I give the final word to my former Miami colleague Howard Kleiman, professor emeritus of the Media, Journalism & Film department. He taught media law courses for 39 years: “The tension between a president and the press is not new. Listen to the Nixon tapes in which he rages against the press and threatens to go after the broadcast licenses held by the Washington Post. The difference with the current administration is that threats have morphed into action and the FCC's unprecedented decision to call for the early renewal of ABC's station licenses is just the latest move of the Trump administration to silence its critics. Regardless of its ultimate success, such pressure by the White House will lead media outlets that lack the resources of Disney/ABC to fight back and take the prudent route and tamp down their criticism of the Trump administration.”

Richard Campbell is professor emeritus and founding chair of the Department of Media, Journalism & Film at Miami University. He is also a co-founder of the Oxford Free Press.