Brendan Carr Takes On Disney — And Escalates Trump’s Media War

Brendan Carr’s embrace of President Donald Trump’s media criticism reached new heights Tuesday — showing a willingness to target broadcasters’ most valuable assets.

The Federal Communications Commission chair’s abrupt move to reconsider the broadcasting licenses of Disney’s eight television stations marks an escalation of conservatives’ many complaints about the mammoth entertainment company’s diversity policies and programming on ABC. It was also the first real move by the FCC toward carrying out Trump’s frequent threats over the years to revoke the licenses of networks whose programs have angered him.

Carr issued an order Tuesday calling in the stations’ licenses for “early renewal” years ahead of their due dates — and suggesting the action was spurred by Disney’s diversity, equity and inclusion practices. The commission has been investigating the company for “unlawful discrimination,” the order said.

But the announcement also came a day after Trump and first lady Melania Trump demanded that Disney-owned ABC fire late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over a joke he had made during his show last week.

In a skit previewing last weekend’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Kimmel remarked that Melania Trump had a “glow like an expectant widow” — a remark the president denounced as a “despicable call to violence” in light of the shooting that later broke out at the dinner Saturday night. Kimmel defended himself on the air Monday, saying he had been joking about the nearly 24-year age discrepancy between the Trumps.

The timing of Tuesday’s order is most likely not a coincidence, said Jeff Westling, a senior scholar of innovation policy at the International Center for Law & Economics, a think tank focused on market issues.

“I don't think anybody's really buying [DEI] as the excuse,” Westling, who once worked for Carr, told POLITICO. “The real issue here is that the president doesn't like the coverage, and the FCC is acting. And that's not a good thing for free speech.”

An FCC spokesperson maintained that Disney’s content was not a factor in Tuesday’s move, suggesting the decision predated the recent Kimmel saga: “As the agency decision makes clear, the early renewal order is based on a long running FCC investigation into Disney’s DEI conduct, not any speech.”

The spokesperson insisted on being quoted anonymously in keeping with commission practice.

Westling calls the license scrutiny a notable escalation: In past months, Carr has often opened investigations based on complaints filed by outside groups — such as one from the conservative Center for American Rights accusing “60 Minutes” of news distortion for its editing of an interview with Kamala Harris. Now the FCC is reopening Disney’s licenses on its own.

Carr’s move drew praise from Daniel Suhr, who heads that center and has frequently cheered the chair’s actions. “Bravo,” Suhr wrote on X. “This renewal review is the right next step to bring transparency and accountability for Disney's decisions.”

White House spokespeople didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment when asked about Carr’s move. Carr’s own usually lively X feed has been quiet since the order’s release.

The eight stations at risk under the FCC’s review offer a powerful and valuable reach into the TV households of America’s biggest cities. Six of them are in the nation’s top 10 television markets, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Philadelphia.

Dynamics on the commission have shifted since the first Trump term, when then-FCC Chair Ajit Pai declined to act on the president’s complaints against the networks. At the time, the Republican chair said that “under the law the FCC does not have the authority to revoke a license of a broadcast station based on the content of a particular newscast.”

Carr, though, has said the commission has been too reluctant in recent decades to enforce requirements that broadcasters avoid distorting the facts, show political even-handedness and otherwise act in the public interest. And he has shown himself eager to tap various levers of FCC power, including use of merger-approval reviews to get companies to scrap their diversity practices, or issuing guidance demanding that daytime and late-night talk shows feature candidates of both parties.

Last month, Carr and his staff waived longstanding media ownership restrictions to approve a $6.2 billion merger between giant TV station owners Nexstar and Tegna — a move that will give those conservative-leaning broadcast executives added power to counter the programming decisions of networks such as ABC.

In a statement Tuesday, Disney defended its qualifications to keep its stations’ licenses, saying it’s “prepared to show that through the appropriate legal channels.” But it could be in for a long fight.

Under Carr’s order, ABC must file its renewal applications by May 28. Carr could then send the issue into an administrative hearing — an often-ominous move in the communications policy world that puts companies before the agency’s administrative law judge.

“It takes years,” Andrew Jay Schwartzman, a veteran public interest lawyer who is a senior counselor to the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, said in an interview. “And then would go to court.”

The FCC would have leeway to hinder Disney in several ways through the proceeding, Schwartzman said. Possible risks include the FCC renewing the license for an unusually short, probationary period rather than the typical term of eight years.

Schwartzman and other critics of Carr’s agenda — including Democratic Commissioner Anna Gomez — frequently argue there’s little merit to Carr’s moves but lament that his opponents have limited legal recourse for challenging his actions.

Any challenges of Carr’s Disney license review would probably have to come deep into the regulatory process.

“There's really no defined way for them to challenge or block it, until that entire process, this yearslong process, takes place,” Schwartzman said. “That’s the point — the process, the legal expense, all that. It’s never going to succeed as a matter of law.”

Schwartzman was among attorneys representing former FCC chairs, including Reagan-era Chair Mark Fowler and Obama-era Chair Tom Wheeler, in petitioning Carr last year to scrap the agency’s decades-old policies against “news distortion,” which he has threatened to wield against broadcasters he accuses of skewing their news coverage and misleading their audiences. The group petitioned the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday to try to get Carr to formally respond to their proposal. (Carr dismissed the petition in an X post last November.)

Carr’s use of power has divided some conservatives who see themselves as champions of free speech. Last fall, Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz (R-Texas) called Carr’s threats to broadcasters “dangerous as hell” after the FCC leader urged ABC and its affiliate stations to “take action” on Kimmel or face potential punishment. ABC wound up suspending Kimmel for six days amid an uproar over remarks he had made about the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Carr had said shortly before Kimmel’s suspension, describing the host’s comments as “truly sick.” He added that broadcasters “have a license granted by us at the FCC, and that comes with it an obligation to operate in the public interest.”

This time, Kimmel remains on the air, at least for now.

In a video Tuesday, hours before the formal FCC license announcement, conservative commentator Glenn Beck argued the government shouldn’t mandate punishment for Kimmel even though he believes ABC should fire him. “I don’t like the idea that it is the president of the United States saying it,” Beck said. “Then it implies that he is putting pressure and everything else.”

Meanwhile, Democrats, who have spent months calling for Carr’s resignation, have even more motivation to make a political issue of his actions — including during the midterms.

“The First Amendment only works if the government can’t threaten your license for content they don’t like,” Olivia Troye, a former Trump administration official who’s now running as a Democrat for a congressional seat in Virginia, wrote on X. “Every broadcaster in America is watching.”

The FCC chair, for his part, is eyeing potential new actions in the days ahead. Carr has teased an interest in making it easier for local broadcasters to preempt national programming. And he recently raised the prospect of reviving rarely enforced FCC rules about the disclosure of political fundraising — an issue that may also ensnare Kimmel, who has raised money for Democrats.

“We’re looking at this issue,” Carr told POLITICO earlier this month. “We are going through the process of making sure that people understand … existing FCC case law. And if we need to put something out to remind people of it, then we may do that.”