Overview

• During a podcast, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr suggested Jimmy Kimmel should be suspended and warned broadcasters, “we can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
• ABC suspended Kimmel’s show this summer following his on-air remarks about Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin, according to the coverage.
• Republican senators David McCormick, Rand Paul, and Ted Cruz publicly criticized Carr’s comments.
• City Journal recounts how past ‘fairness’ and ‘news distortion’ efforts—from FDR’s era through the Fairness Doctrine—were used against political opponents and risk viewpoint-based censorship.
• Analysts say renewed enforcement would likely hit local TV and especially talk radio with large conservative audiences, while a Washington Examiner essay urges abolishing the FCC to safeguard free expression.