2 months ago
As authorities attorneys activity to extremity Nexstar‘s merger pinch Tegna, a caller group is appealing nan FCC‘s greenlight to nan monolithic broadcast merger, calling retired Donald Trump‘s “unprecedented statesmanlike directive” to “Get That Deal Done!”
The plaintiffs successful nan lawsuit see Newsmax and a postulation of authorities cablegram and broadband associations, including ones successful Pennsylvania, Washington, Indiana, Mississippi and Tennessee. DirecTV, which has already revenge a abstracted antitrust lawsuit, is besides seeking to subordinate nan caller lawsuit.
The FCC connected Thursday approved nan merger, which creates a broadcast elephantine pinch 259 stations reaching 80% of nan country.
About 15 minutes aft nan FCC announced their motion disconnected connected nan merger, Nexstar announced that it had closed nan transaction.
The group’s appeal, revenge connected Saturday, challenges nan FCC’s assistance of a waiver to Nexstar from a nationalist ownership norm that limits immoderate entity from owning stations that collectively scope much than 39% of nan country. The plaintiffs reason that only Congress tin raise that cap, and nan waiver “represented an unreasoned departure from anterior FCC precedent conditioning support of licence transportation applications connected mandatory divestitures calculated to guarantee nan applicants’ compliance pinch nan nationalist assemblage scope limitation.”
The suit besides challenges nan FCC’s rationale for waiving of nan duopoly rule, which prohibirs 1 institution from owning much than 2 stations successful nan aforesaid market.
The entreaty besides focuses connected nan process, calling nan FCC support “anything but ordinary.”
In February, Trump endorsed nan transaction successful a station connected Truth Social, and FCC Chairman Brendan Carr responded connected X pinch his approval. The transaction, however, was still successful nan midst of FCC review. The merger was approved by nan FCC’s Media Bureau, and did not spell to a afloat committee vote.
The entreaty stated, “Binding precedent from some this Court and nan FCC requires nan Commission to clasp a proceeding and put this awesome transaction to an up-or-down vote, to guarantee a rogue Bureau is not moving roughshod complete statutory limits. But those precedents went retired nan model aft nan President’s societal media missive, which Chairman Carr promptly echoed by directing nan Media Bureau to ‘get [the deal] done.’ Taking those marching orders to heart, nan Bureau dashed retired an bid approving nan transaction successful little than 4 months—well awkward of nan 180-day timeline to which nan Commission mostly aspires, and obscurity adjacent nan 200-400 days that anterior broadcast mergers person required.”
The plaintiffs are asking nan tribunal for an emergency enactment arsenic nan entreaty proceeds.
Less than a time earlier nan FCC approved nan transaction, a group of attorneys general, including California’s Rob Bonta, revenge an antitrust suit to artifact nan transaction. After Nexstar announced nan woody had closed, nan AGs asked a national tribunal to rumor a impermanent restraining bid to extremity it.
An FCC spokesperson did not instantly return a petition for comment.
Supporting nan entreaty is nan American Conservative Union Foundation’s Center for Regulatory Freedom, which is portion of nan CPAC Foundation. They wrote successful a friend of nan tribunal brief, “Waiving nan ownership rules will only promote further media consolidation and taste polarization and limit nan public’s entree to independent section voices.”
