FCC Chair Confirms ‘View’ Probe, Says He’s ‘Entertained’ by Colbert-CBS Drama

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr confirmed the agency was investigating “The View” for potentially violating its equal-time rule over its interview with Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico.

“The FCC has an enforcement action underway on that, and we’re taking a look at it,” Carr told reporters at a press conference on Wednesday. Talarico appeared on the program’s Feb. 2 episode, weeks after his opponent, Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett, made an appearance.

Spokespeople for ABC News and “The View” did not respond to an immediate request for comment.

Carr also said he was “highly entertained” by Talarico’s claims that the FCC blocked “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” from broadcasting an interview with Talarico on Monday. Talarico said he raised $2.5 million after CBS opted not to air the interview on its broadcast network, relegating it to the “Late Show” YouTube channel, though the FCC played no official role.

“I think yesterday was a perfect encapsulation of why the American people have more trust in gas station sushi than they do in the national news media,” the chairman said.

Colbert said the decision not to air the interview spurred from a conversation with network lawyers, who he said told him “in no uncertain terms” that he could not air the interview. That decision, he said, came after Carr issued a letter last month that warned shows like “The Late Show“ and “The View“ the agency was considering ending a long-standing exception for talk shows that allowed them to conduct interviews with politicians without triggering the rule. (CBS later said it did not prevent Colbert from airing the interview and simply provided guidance on how it may trigger the equal-time issue. Colbert called the network’s statement “crap.”)

Carr told reporters on Wednesday that the longstanding precedent affording shows like “The View” and “The Late Show” exceptions may no longer hold.

He said their respective networks needed to demonstrate to the agency why they qualified as a bona fide news program, which would grant an exception, and not as shows hosted by partisan political actors, which he has claimed they might. Neither Disney or CBS have come forward with such a filing, Carr said.

“People can come forward with their own showings and a petition for declarative ruling, but this is something that will be explored as part of the FCC case law,” he said. “The idea is that if you’re a partisan political actor under the case law, then you’re likely not going to qualify under the bonafide news exception.”

The post FCC Chair Confirms ‘View’ Probe, Says He’s ‘Entertained’ by Colbert-CBS Drama appeared first on TheWrap.