FCC seeks to shift power from national programmers to local broadcasters in public interest push

With trust in legacy media allegedly crumbling, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr suggested the solution is clear — shift influence away from the national gatekeepers and back into local hands.

“Something has to change…” Carr said during “MediaBuzz” on Sunday. 

“What the FCC is charged with is making sure that broadcast media – not cable – [operates in the public interest], so I think that’s one of the things that we’re pushing for is how do we re-empower these broadcasters who actually serve the interests of their local communities?”

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“So much of this now is driven by the national programmers, whether it’s ABC, CBS, or NBC,” he continued, “So one of things we’re trying to do with the FCC is how we empower local, constrain the power of those national programmers so that these broadcasters can actually serve their local communities.”

Carr’s comments come after his agency approved a takeover of Paramount and CBS by the entertainment studio Skydance last month.

The approval came on the heels of CBS announcing the upcoming demise of Stephen Colbert’s “Late Show” and President Donald Trump’s legal saga with the network over “60 Minutes” interview editing, fueling allegations of backroom dealings and political pressure behind the merger approval.

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Skydance has denied any role in the cancellation of Stephen Colbert’s late-night show, saying it was notified after the decision and had fully complied with anti-bribery laws. The defense came in a letter from Skydance General Counsel Stephanie Kyoko McKinnon to Senate Democrats, who raised questions about political pressure ahead of the Paramount acquisition.

Carr, however, framed the moment as part of a seismic change in how media power is structured, and who controls the narrative, as he lauded Skydance’s commitment to bring more balanced news.

“There are seismic changes taking place right now across the legacy media landscape. There’s a lot of reasons for that, but fundamentally I think it goes back to President Trump,” Carr said.

“He ran directly at the legacy national media, and he smashed the facade that they get to decide what we think and what we get to say… Up to now, they were gatekeepers, and no one had the courage to call them out on it, number one. And number two, we didn’t have access to the wide variety of information, the internet, streaming services, social media, to realize that we don’t have to take what the media is saying. 

“There’s a real credibility crisis right now for legacy media, whether it’s from COVID origin stories, whether it’s shutting down Hunter Biden laptop, whether it’s Russiagate. The list goes on and on and trust in mainstream media is falling, so I think a lot of these people who’ve made business models off of their gatekeeper status are worried, so they’re looking to blame Trump. And, to some extent, President Trump is the reason why their business models are failing, but not for exactly the reasons that they think.”

Fox News’ Joseph A. Wulfsohn and David Rutz contributed to this report.