Trump's FCC chair thinks TV stations should 'get to decide what the American people think'

Explaining the “massive shift” he intends to impose on the focus of the Federal Communications Commission, Chairman Brendan Carr announced that he will take America back to the era when local television stations shaped what the American people “think.”

“So again,” Carr told Fox News on Thursday, “we’re going back to that era when local TV stations, judging the public interest, get to decide what the American people think.”

“And again, we’re constraining the power through those actions of Disney, of Comcast. And I think the American public can be much better off. But, yeah, I don’t think this is the last shoe to drop,” he said, appearing to refer to the suspension of ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel.

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“This is a massive shift that’s taking place in the media ecosystem, and I think the consequences are going to continue to flow,” he declared.

On Thursday, speaking aboard Air Force One, President Donald Trump wrongly suggested that broadcast networks, licensed by the FCC, are “not allowed” to criticize him.

“When you have a network and you have evening shows and all they do is hit Trump, that’s all they do — if you go back, I guess they haven’t had a conservative one in years, or something — when you go back and take a look, all they do is hit Trump. They’re licensed. They’re not allowed to do that,” Trump said.

Carr is one of the authors of The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. President Donald Trump praised Carr as “a warrior for Free Speech,” CBS News reported last year.

There are few “local” television stations left in the U.S., in the sense that nearly all are owned by several major broadcast conglomerates, including Nexstar Media Group, Sinclair Broadcast Group, Gray Television, Tegna, Hearst and Scripps.

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