NBC didn’t contact the FCC after President Donald Trump’s tweeted questioning whether the network's “license” could be pulled, said NBC Broadcasting and Sports Chairman Mark Lazarus during panels (see 1710180023) at the NAB Show New York Wednesday. Lazarus declined to comment on Chairman Ajit Pai’s remarks that the FCC wouldn’t unilaterally take a station’s license. Asked about the president’s tweets, he said NBC News valued editorial independence and he's confident in NBC’s reporting: “We have great confidence that the FCC will stand by our First Amendment rights and support us and we have every confidence our licenses will be renewed.” FCC Chairman Ajit Pai faces heat for not addressing more squarely the tweets. Some Democrats won't get a Senate Commerce Committee FCC oversight hearing on the matter.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C Circuit ruled Tuesday that FCC policy of collecting information on multilingual emergency alert system notices without requiring such alerts is reasonable, denying (in Pacer) a petition for review from public interest groups including the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (see 1705110061). “If Congress intended to require multi-lingual communications in general, and multi-lingual emergency alerts in particular, we would expect Congress to have spoken far more clearly than it has done” said the majority opinion by Judge Brett Kavanaugh joined by Judge Karen Henderson. Judge Patricia Millett agreed with the majority in ruling the FCC hadn’t violated anti-discrimination provisions of the Communications Act, but said in a dissent the agency’s 11-year delay in deciding on multilingual EAS messages was arbitrary and capricious. “The problem of ensuring effective communication to the public during crises is too grave to be ensnared in seemingly interminable bureaucratic limbo,” Millett said. Despite ruling in the FCC’s favor, Kavanaugh needled the agency for operating on “bureaucracy standard time.” Communications Act provisions against discrimination don’t specifically compel the FCC to require emergency alerting in languages other than English, Kavanaugh said. The commission isn’t being arbitrary in not acting on multilingual alerts because there are legal and technical issues with enacting them, such as the lack of FCC authority over alert originators such as local governments, the majority said. It “would be reasonable for the FCC to flatly say that the alert originators (the federal, state, and local government entities) are the parties responsible for deciding whether and when to issue emergency alerts in languages in addition to English,” Kavanaugh said. The FCC plan to seek more information from EAS entities is a repeat of its previous information requests, and the court shouldn’t allow the agency to use it as a delaying tactic any longer, Millett said. “Choosing to repeat an inquiry that has twice been asked and answered, the Commission identified no reason to believe that round three of reporting would reveal new ways to address the multilingual problem.” The majority opinion suggested the agency cease delays. “The FCC should move expeditiously in finally deciding whether to impose a multi-lingual requirement on broadcasters, or instead to leave the issue with alert originators and others,” the opinion said. “At some point, the FCC must fish or cut bait on this question.” The League of United Latin American Citizens and the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council said the decision wasn’t a total loss. “One point of agreement by all three judges is that the FCC has taken far too long to act,” the groups said in a news release. “Calling the FCC’s delay ‘bureaucracy standard time,’ the panel majority called on the FCC to ‘move expeditiously.’”
An ATSC 3.0 draft order that requires that broadcasters offer “substantially similar” 1.0 and 3.0 simulcasts and doesn’t prevent the new standard from coming up in retransmission consent negotiations is widely expected to be ready for the FCC’s Nov. 16 commissioners' meeting, said industry officials. The Media Bureau is believed to be nearly finished preparing the order, with the aim of circulating it by Oct. 26, in time for the November agenda, industry officials said in interviews. Meantime, MVPDs and broadcasters are stepping up their lobbying on the 3.0 transition.
The Incentive Auction Task Force will let repacked broadcasters and MVPDs draw on $1 billion of the $1.75 billion repacking reimbursement fund upfront, holding the rest in reserve for future costs, the IATF said in a public notice in docket 16-306 Monday (see 1710160038). Meanwhile, a bipartisan group of legislators as expected formally asked FCC Chairman Ajit Pai not to extend the repacking deadline beyond July 3, 2020 (see 1709290060 and 1710060057).
The FCC Incentive Auction Task Force will allow mostly broadcasters and some MVPDs to draw initially on $1 billion of the $1.75 billion repacking reimbursement fund, the IATF announced. That’s less than was requested by NAB, Ion and public TV groups. But the estimated cost of the repacking dropped from $2.12 billion to $1.86 billion, IATF said, a number likely to keep changing as repacking progresses. A smaller shortfall would make it more likely that Congress will authorize more funds to make up the gap, broadcast industry officials said.
Democratic FCC Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel are seen as unlikely to fully support a draft order that would eliminate the main studio rule, broadcast industry officials told us. The item is seen as unlikely to change much from an original public draft before the Oct. 24 commissioners' meeting, an FCC official told us. The FCC's Democrats are seen as unlikely to unreservedly vote in favor of the draft order, and may concur or dissent instead, industry officials told us.
DOJ antitrust thresholds would act as a check on radio groups expanding if the FCC eliminated the AM/FM subcap rules, said Beasley Media CEO Caroline Beasley and Urban One CEO Alfred Liggins on a panel at the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters Broadcast Management Conference Thursday. DOJ limits on broadcasters expanding too much in any market would stop “wholesale” consolidation of radio owners maneuvering to acquire more FM stations after subcap elimination, Liggins said. That makes elimination of the subcaps “not as scary” as it might appear to AM broadcasters, he said. Beasley and Liggins support elimination or relaxation of the subcaps, though Liggins -- who is black -- conceded that the loosening of the rule would “not be great for minority ownership.” Consolidation would be a boost to the radio industry, Liggins said. NABOB President Jim Winston said that eliminating subcaps would soon lead to the demise of the AM radio industry, with large companies likely jettisoning such stations, manufacturers ceasing to make the equipment, and AM engineers unable to find work. Proponents of AM should seek to elevate the band’s sound rather than keep rules in place that limit companies’ growth, Beasley said. Broadcasting needs the ability to consolidate, said Tegna CEO Dave Lougee. Broadcasters face more competition than they once did and must concentrate on content and specifically live and local content, Lougee said. There’s “not a great market for non-day and date specific content,” Lougee said. “What’s on the air needs to be live,” Lougee said. “That doesn’t mean it needs to be news.” Restructuring of debt-burdened iHeartMedia and Cumulus is unlikely to lead to many spun-off stations, Liggins said. Management of iHeart wants to keep “scale” and instead of offloading stations, would likely seek to grow if ownership rules are relaxed, Liggins said. Cumulus could seek some transactions, but they are likely to be station swaps that allow it to consolidate its reach to certain markets, Liggins said.
A tweet from President Donald Trump Wednesday condemning “NBC and the Networks” for airing “Fake News” and questioning whether it would be appropriate to “challenge their License” was seen as a possible threat to freedom of the news-media yet extremely unlikely to lead to any actual action, media scholars and communications attorneys told us.
A public notice announcing how much of the $1.75 billion repacking reimbursement fund will be allocated upfront to broadcasters will be issued “soon,” FCC Incentive Auction Task Force staff said Tuesday. Many broadcasters have been holding off on ordering repacking-related equipment until the amount of reimbursement money is announced, said broadcast attorneys and NAB filings in docket 14-252. IATF said the initial allocation would be “an amount sufficient to allow stations and MVPDs to get started with their channel transitions." NAB, Ion and other broadcasters pressed the IATF in recent weeks to offer more of the funds upfront (see 1709280068). IATF Chair Jeanne Kiddoo said the commission wants to hold some of the fund in reserve to deal with any differences between estimated and actual costs and to avoid having to get back funds from broadcasters with lower-than-expected expenses (see 1707270051).
Sinclair Broadcast and Tribune didn’t give specifics on how they will bring their proposed deal into compliance with FCC ownership rules, in the response this week to an agency request for more information, but industry attorneys told us that they don’t believe that reticence makes an FCC OK of the transaction less likely. Sinclair is negotiating with the DOJ and still deciding its specific course of action, and the FCC is expected to soon make changes to its ownership rules, Sinclair said. “It is premature at this point for Sinclair to know what specific steps will be required to comply” with FCC ownership rules, Sinclair said. “By failing to provide serious answers to the FCC’s straight forward questions, Sinclair-Tribune is refusing to respect the Commission’s role,” said a statement from the Coalition to Save Local Media, a group formed to oppose the Tribune deal.