As we expected, when President Donald Trump was inaugurated as the 47th President, Commissioner Brendan Carr was named as the new Chairman of the FCC. This happened quickly, as former FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel was cleared off the Federal Communication Commission’s website right away.
Carr is already on the Commission, so it was easy to appoint him as the new Chair. He’s been with the FCC since 2012 and, definitely, has ideas. Carr has been very vocal about how he believes the media should be regulated.
The first thing Carr has done was to end DEI, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, efforts at the FCC. Carr stated, “Promoting invidious forms of discrimination runs contrary to the Communications Act and deprives Americans of their rights to fair and equal treatment under the law. It also represents a wasteful expenditure of taxpayer resources.” Recently, FCC released data showing very few broadcast radio and TV stations were owned by minorities and women.
Back in November, after Trump was elected and announced his plans for Carr, we got a little insight into what we could expect from the administration. For instance, before Carr came into play, bureaus could approve or deny satellite and broadcast licenses, issue fines and penalties, and hinder deals. Now, Carr plans to put all the decision making in his hands.
Previously, the commission had advisory groups made up of public interest people and industry reps. Now, they’ll probably be joined as one group, and current members may be forced out. Or they just may get rid of the groups altogether.
Project 2025 has a section where Carr explains “rapidly evolving market conditions counsel in favor of eliminating many of the heavy-handed FCC regulations that were adopted in an era when every technology operated in a silo. These include many of the FCC’s media ownership rules, which can have the effect of restricting investment and competition because those regulations assume a far more limited set of competitors for advertising dollars than exist today.” What does that mean? He wants to bring the FCC regulations into the 21st century.
Moreso, he addressed what broadcasters are doing on air by saying the FCC “must dismantle the censorship cartel and restore free speech rights for everyday Americans.” Carr acknowledged the strict regulations from Facebook, Google, Apple and Microsoft stating, “Over those 12 years, government control has increased and your freedoms have decreased.”
This is just the tip of the iceberg and I’m sure we’ll hear much more in the coming days.