How FCC Chairman Carr Has Fueled Trump's Authoritarian Takeover
The day Donald Trump began his second term, Brendan Carr became the FCC chairman. From the start, Carr has exploited his government perch to issue threatening letters, initiate investigations, threaten to revoke broadcast licenses and even stall merger-review processes based on newsrooms’ editorial decisions.
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez reported in public remarks that local television and radio broadcasters from around the country are already advising their reporters to be careful about how they cover stories for fear of government retribution. This is the chilling outcome of Carr’s war on free speech.
In his short tenure as FCC chairman, Carr has significantly undermined free speech and press freedom as he carries out Trump’s promises of retribution for those who report critically on his actions or who provide airtime to his political opponents.
This is how Chairman Carr has abused his power to sabotage First Amendment rights:
1. Punishing CBS for airing an interview with Kamala Harris: When CBS’ 60 Minutes aired an interview with then-Vice President Harris, then-commissioner Carr claimed that the standard journalistic practice of editing interviews in this case violated the FCC’s seldom-invoked “news distortion doctrine.” As FCC chairman — and against the backdrop of Donald Trump’s $20 billion lawsuit against CBS parent-company Paramount on the same matter — Carr demanded that the network release the full interview transcript.
He also reopened a complaint that his predecessor, Jessica Rosenworcel, had dismissed because, in her words, it sought “to weaponize the licensing authority of the FCC in a way that is fundamentally at odds with the First Amendment.” Carr has also promised that the content of the 60 Minutes complaint will factor into the FCC’s review of a merger between Paramount and Skydance.
2. Harassing ABC for fact checking Trump on the debate stage: Even before the election, Trump suggested that ABC should lose its broadcast licenses because the moderators dared to fact check him during his September debate with Harris. When asked directly about this at a hearing in the House of Representatives, Carr refused to speak out against Trump’s comments. Once Carr became chairman, he resurrected a complaint against ABC that Rosenworcel had dismissed on the grounds that “the FCC should not be the President’s speech police.”
3. Threatening to revoke NBC’s broadcast licenses for Kamala Harris’ SNL appearance: In October, Carr attacked NBC after Harris appeared on Saturday Night Live, wrongly calling it “a clear and blatant effort to evade the equal time rule” — even though NBC did indeed give Trump equal time that same weekend. Carr suggested on a subsequent Fox News appearance that the FCC should “keep every remedy on the table,” including revocation of NBC’s broadcast licenses.
A Freedom of Information Act request revealed that Carr already knew that NBC had granted Trump equal time when he claimed that NBC had violated the rule. As FCC chairman, Carr reinstated a related complaint against NBC that Rosenworcel had dismissed as a politically motivated effort “to curtail freedom of the press and undermine the First Amendment.”
4. Investigating public media and calling for Congress to zero out funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting: It’s no accident that “high levels of secure funding for public media systems and strong structural protections for the political and economic independence of those systems are consistently and positively correlated with healthy democracies.” To scare their journalists into silence, Carr opened an investigation into NPR and PBS — and has called on Congress to gut CPB’s funding, even though the United States spends far less on public media than most democracies.
5. Intimidating a broadcast-radio station about its news content: In what he styled a “formal inquiry” into KCBS radio-station owner Audacy, Carr alleged that the station’s news programming violated the broadcaster’s public-interest obligations — even though the FCC has rightfully shied away from invoking public-interest obligations to force news editors to either publish or withhold newsworthy information from their audiences.
Of course, Trump and Carr opposed the news in question: It informed people about the location of ICE agents who have been unlawfully detaining U.S. residents and citizens alike for exercising their free-speech rights or even simply driving to work. Carr’s letter to Audacy appeared on the FCC website on March 12, 2025, but mysteriously disappeared the next day, when Sen. Richard Blumenthal launched an inquiry into the FCC’s political targeting of newsrooms.
6. Directing the FCC Enforcement Bureau to investigate Comcast NBCUniversal and Verizon for fostering diversity, equity and inclusion: Following a Trump executive order that banned DEI, Carr fired off letters to Comcast and Verizon that twisted civil-rights law on its head. His letters suggested that efforts to train and support women and people of color who have faced societal discrimination are somehow themselves “discriminatory.”
Carr has directed the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau to investigate the companies’ “DEI initiatives, preferences, mandates, policies, programs, and activities.” And he’s suggested that Verizon’s proposed purchase of Frontier Communications, which is pending before the agency, may hinge on the outcomes of his DEI witch hunt.
7. Pressuring social-media companies — which he has no authority over — to amplify hate and lies: Carr has sent multiple letters to social-media companies pushing his own warped version of free speech where it’s A-OK for the government to dictate the editorial decisions of private American companies. He has demanded a briefing from major social-media companies to stymie their compliance with Europe’s Digital Services Act and pressured them to stop working with fact checkers.
In his chapter in the far-right Project 2025 roadmap, Carr argued for a dramatic expansion of the FCC’s authority to allow it to regulate the speech of social-media platforms. He wants to manipulate Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act to strip social-media companies of their rights to moderate content, and force them to host toxic racism, misogyny and other forms of hatred that are unpopular with advertisers and the American people alike.
Carr’s actions threaten democracy itself
In February, Free Press hosted a webinar with global experts on authoritarianism to learn about the warning signs of democratic backsliding. Panelists included Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa — who was jailed for her reporting on former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte — as well as social scientists from Poland and Hungary who have fought their countries’ descents into authoritarianism. These experts urged Americans to reject attacks on press freedom. They shared that attacks on the press that were similar to Carr’s helped quash dissent in their own countries, paving the way for an erosion of democratic norms.
The good news is that we haven’t lost the Fourth Estate — yet. Many incredible journalists and media institutions in the United States are holding the line on democracy and heroically reporting facts under the threat of government retaliation — and sometimes even facing violence from those who believe Trump’s claims that the press is the “enemy of the people.” Notably, Paramount has filed a motion to dismiss Trump’s meritless lawsuit against 60 Minutes.
Yet many media institutions have already capitulated to this attack on their freedoms, with Disney/ABC settling a specious defamation lawsuit with President Trump, and tech barons like Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg lining up to pay their way into his good graces (and onto his inauguration stage).
To protect our democracy, we need media entities to fight for their constitutional rights — and we need people to demand free speech, to condemn attacks on free expression, and to call elected officials and ask them to hold the FCC accountable. We need more leaders like Sen. Blumenthal, FCC Commissioner Gomez and former FCC Chairwoman Rosenworcel who will protect press freedom.
We need more support for the Broadcast Freedom and Independence Act, which Reps. Doris Matsui, Nanette Barragán and Jennifer L. McClellan, and Sens. Ben Ray Luján, Jacky Rosen and Ed Markey have sponsored. That bill explicitly states that the FCC is an independent agency and that it must not use its authority to execute politically motivated attacks against broadcast licensees. It would prohibit the FCC from taking any kind of action — including revoking any license or authorization — against any person based on their viewpoints. No matter one’s political affiliation, they should be able to support such a basic protection of the First Amendment.
As Carr wields his immense power to crush dissent, we must speak out now. During Free Press’ webinar on authoritarianism, Maria Ressa underscored the urgency of this moment. “Every time you give up your rights, you’re pushed back further,” said Ressa. “Silence not only makes you complicit, it makes you weaker.”
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