The press is filled with stories predicting the demise of linear broadcast television. And certainly it is true that we face many obstacles, including streaming services taking our viewers and advertisers, cable cord cutting eroding our retransmission revenues, and our own networks climbing on the streaming bandwagon. But what if there was a new broadcast standard that held the promise of connecting broadcasters not only to television receivers, but also to 5G wireless smartphones and tablets, opening a whole new market to our transmission? The good news is that there is such a standard and it is called 5G broadcast. And because 5G broadcast (unlike ATSC 3.0) was adopted as part of the 3G PP 5G standard, it holds the key to our future. All we have to do is join large portions of the world in adopting this standard.
I have the greatest respect for my longtime friend Mark Aitken, who has advocated with great skill to try to make ATSC 3.0 the American standard for next-gen TV. And I have great admiration for Sinclair Broadcasting and its principal, David Smith. David probably is the only group station owner who has seated himself at a bench and actually built a UHF transmitter.
Let me state upfront that no one is paying me to write this article and that I do not own a single share of stock in Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, mobile chip makers or phone manufacturing companies. My investments are in boring municipal bonds with no relation whatsoever to the television or telecom industries.
The broadcasting industry is going to transition from ATSC1 to a next generation standard. The two principal choices available to us are (1) ATSC 3.0 and (2) 5G Broadcast.
An international standards body called 3GPP sets the standards for all cellular devices in the world. All of the major cellular device manufactures (Apple, Samsung, etc.) build their devices in compliance with the 3GPP standards. 3GPP compliant devices only receive signals that are part of the 3GPP family of 5G global standards; This means that broadcasters that transition to the 5G Broadcast standard will be able to transmit directly to the hundreds of millions of next generation 5G smartphones and tablets.
By contrast, ATSC 3.0 is not a part of the 3GPP family of cellular standards, and, therefore, cannot and will not be able to be received by smartphones and tablets compliant with the 3GPP standards. For this reason, Sinclair and others tried diligently to get ATSC 3.0 approved by 3GPP as part of their standards. Ultimately, 3GPP refused to incorporate ATSC 3.0 into its
LTE-based 5G Broadcast is better suited for integration with 3GPP modems because it reuses nearly all existing LTE/5G components and hardware, whereas ATSC 3.0 requires different implementations across critical building blocks.
So far public and private broadcast operators in Germany, France, Italy, Austria, Estonia, Spain and the Czech Republic came forward and announced their intentions to deploy the 5G Broadcast standard. And there is continuing interest in 5G Broadcast in Malaysia, China and Brazil, with active trials and evaluation of the technology. With several large countries committing to 5G broadcast, I expect TV set manufacturers to incorporate 5G broadcast receivers to meet marketplace demand–no government mandates necessary.
Because of trial broadcasts around the world, including an FCC approved trial by low power Station WWOO in the Boston market, we don’t need to speculate about whether 5G Broadcast can be received by 5G smartphones. Below is a photo of the WWOO broadcast being received by a prototype next generation smartphone!
SIMPLY STATED, IT WORKS!!
So, American full power TV broadcasters face the following choice – Do you want to transition to a next-gen standard that broadens your market to include reception by 5G cellular devices, or do you want to transition to a standard that cannot be received by those devices?
The question answers itself.
Advocates for ATSC 3.0 try mightily to think of applications that could make up for their standard’s lack of access to 3GPP cellular devices. They argue that car manufacturers will go to the expense of adding ATSC 3.0 receivers to their cars to receive software downloads. But since all cars (even my low-tech minivan) already have 5G transceivers that serve that function, that seems very unlikely. Or they argue that an ATSC 3.0-based new GPS system will be the key to our future. That seems a real stretch, and certainly no substitute for gaining access to 3GPP cellular devices.
So why is Sinclair pushing so hard for ATSC 3.0? The simple answer is that they have a conflict – not a bad or evil conflict – just a conflict. Sinclair owns a vast portion of the intellectual property that makes up the ATSC 3.0 standard. That means that they stand to reap a fortune in royalties if American full power broadcasters adopt ATSC 3.0. All other TV broadcasters can make their choice without being burdened by that conflict!
In my opinion the only thing that can save broadcasting from extinction is to transition to 5G Broadcast and transmit directly to both TV receivers and 3GPP cellular devices and thereby join the mobile future.
I keep reading that linear broadcasting is in an inevitable decline, but it doesn’t have to be.
The jackpot market that can save the industry is the ability to broadcast and datacast directly to wireless mobile devices including 300 million-plus smartphones and over 200 million tablets in the U.S. But we have to be smart about the technology choice we make to get us there.
The 3GPP is a global standards organization that controls the technology that can be built into mobile devices. All mainstream wireless device manufacturers adhere to the 3GPP standards.
3GPP approves only global standards, not regional standards. ATSC is a regional standard and has not been approved by 3GPP. Sinclair and others have tried, valiantly but unsuccessfully, to get ATSC added to the 3GPP standard. And I believe that the prospect of 3GPP changing its mind is nil.
The 3GPP standards do include a broadcast technology: 5G broadcast. Broadcasters that utilize 5G broadcast technology can broadcast to 5G broadcast TVs and can broadcast and datacast directly to 3GPP mobile devices. And new chips promise to increase the throughput of 5G broadcast to the point that it will exceed ATSC 3.0.
5G broadcast is taking off in Europe, and 3GPP has approved a new spectrum band that includes all U.S. UHF broadcast channels.
Recently the broadcast industry announced a plan to force a transition to ATSC 3.0. It includes requiring consumers to buy new TVs, converter boxes or dongles that receive 3.0. But at the end of that transition, broadcasters still will not be able to broadcast or datacast directly to the half-billion devices waiting to receive broadcast programming and data and breathe exciting and lucrative new life into the industry.
This leads me to make a suggestion that I recognize will be unwelcome by all those who have worked so hard to make ATSC 3.0 a reality: If we are going to put consumers and the industry through a wrenching and difficult transition, wouldn’t it make more sense to transition to a technology that would open a vast new market for the broadcast industry and end all the talk about inevitable decline? That technology is 5G broadcast.
PS: I am not blaming anyone else for ATSC. I was on the NAB board and voted for it. At the time I had never heard of 3GPP and I suspect that the same is true of many of my fellow board members
Note: This blog represents my own experience and opinions. I served as President of the Association of Independent Television Stations, President of Network Distribution for Fox Broadcasting Company, President of the ABC Television Network and Executive Vice President of the Walt Disney Company. No one recruited me or compensated me to post this.
FCC Chairman-Designate Brendan Carr recently waded into the economics of the relationship between broadcast networks and local stations. In my opinion, he may be doing this in furtherance of President elect Trump‘s promised retribution against the broadcast networks.
I spent much of my career at the intersection of broadcast networks and their local station affiliates. The networks have programming to sell and the stations desire to buy that programming to enhance the profitability of their stations. It is a garden variety, free market buyer/seller relationship in which there is no role for the government.
In the analog era, there were very few local stations in most markets. That gave the stations the leverage to demand and receive compensation from the networks in return for broadcasting their programs. As more stations signed on the air and converted from analog to digital (that enabled one station to broadcast multiple channels), the leverage began to shift. The development of online streaming provided the networks with even more distribution opportunities. And competition from those new distribution opportunities drove the shift to station’s paying networks.just like they pay every other program provider.
Stations unhappy with the affiliation terms offered by their network always have the option to switch networks or become an independent station. For example in 2002 Graham Media, unhappy with the affiliation terms offered by CBS, terminated their affiliation with that network in Jacksonville, FL. I have no knowledge of how the station fared as an independent, but Graham chose to stick with their network affiliations at all of their other stations. And, virtually every other network affiliated station in the country decided to stay with their networks, indicating that while they might prefer better economic terms, they concluded that sticking with their network was the best way to maximize station profitability. Just this week, Grey television, one of the largest owners of local television stations, renewed their affiliation with the ABC television network for 25 of their local stations. In making the announcement Gray’s President stated “These agreements recognize our ABC affiliates’ commitment to public service and will help them continue to serve their communities.”
I was appointed President of the ABC television network in 1997. The local ABC affiliate stations were making piles of money and the network was losing $240 million a year – roughly the amount the network was paying the local stations in compensation. I set out to reverse the flow of money so that stations would pay for network programming just like they paid for other programming like “Wheel of Fortune”. I was direct and honest with the affiliate board about my intentions. They argued that Disney, which had just paid a fortune to buy ABC, should be willing to operate the network at losses of hundreds of millions of dollars, because ABC owned eight of the 230 affiliates that would benefit from the existence of the network. I respectfully told them that the network losses were unsustainable and not good for the network or the affiliates.
Fisher Broadcasting was the first ABC affiliate to agree to pay the network. It did so not because of pressure from ABC, but because of competition from an another local station in its market owned by Belo Communications. Belo offered to pay ABC to be permitted to broadcast ABC programming on Belo’s second digital channel (D2). ABC offered Fisher the opportunity to keep its ABC affiliation by matching the offer from Belo which Fisher wisely elected to do. The industry shift from networks paying stations to stations paying networks has been driven largely by the competitive marketplace forces of new stations, new channels and other distribution opportunities for the networks.
In the beginning, station payments to networks often were expressed as a percentage of retransmission consent revenue. However, today most stations pay straightforward payments for network programming unrelated to retransmission consent revenues.
In my opinion, there is absolutely no basis in the Communications Act for the FCC to be lecturing any of the parties in this commercial marketplace about economic terms. The logical extension of FCC involvement in the economics of network affiliations would lead to the agency opening offices in New York or California dictatingwhich programs to put on broadcast networks and which programs to put on streaming services or other distribution platforms – Reductio ad absurdum!
For over 100 years women in America were treated as second class human beings — not even allowed to vote. And now America has elected a President who says men can “grab women by their pussy“ and a Vice President who says that women must vote the same way as their husbands (you know, the 19th Amendment says you can vote, but only if you vote the same way as your husband). Despite Vice President Harris’s best efforts, it appears that we are “going back.”
What does all this mean for the self-esteem of young girls growing up in our country? The early signs are not good. The day after the election, boys in public schools in Colorado, inspired by the “grab them by the pussy“ President Elect, created semi circular gauntlets around the entrances of girls bathrooms and shouted misogynistic taunts at the girls just trying to get to the restroom. I know this because one of our wonderful granddaughters was forced to struggle through that gauntlet, and also from reports from dozens of parents in Colorado. Friends in other cities report similar behavior in their schools.
I don’t blame the boys, many of whom have inferiority complexes from being consistently outperformed by the girls in their classes. But our President and other political leaders are supposed to serve as role models for our youth. Instead, President Elect Trump has an undeniable track record of misogyny – his quote about grabbing women, his falsification of business records to cover up an affair with a porn star while his wife was at home nursing their newborn son, his conviction for sexual assault of E. Jean Carroll, and the unbelievably crude references that he sprinkles into his public speeches. And how do young boys learn this crude rhetoric? They hear it at home, consume it online, and then show up at school to parrot the misogyny.
There are many decent individuals who are seeking positions in Trump’s administration. Most of them have daughters and granddaughters that they love. It is absolutely imperative that they speak out – now – against the misogyny that currently permeates the Trump world. Specifically, I implore FCC Commissioners Carr and Simington — both of whom aspire to positions in the Trump administration — to speak out against misogyny to confirm what I believe to be their character.
The White House is formally calling on Fox News to correct its dishonest coverage of bribery and corruption allegations against President Joe Biden.
In a letter sent to the right-wing network’s top brass this week, which Reliable Sources is first to report, Ian Sams, a top White House spokesperson, noted that the ex-FBI informant who was the source of the bribery claims has now been charged by federal authorities for allegedly fabricating the story.
“Despite this, Fox has taken no steps to retract, correct, or update its reporting on this false allegation from 2023,” Sams said in his letter to Fox News chief executive Suzanne Scott, president Jay Wallace, and Washington bureau chief Bryan Boughton.
Over the course of the last year, Fox News hosts have relentlessly promoted serious corruption claims against the purported “Biden crime family,” which have saturated the conservative information space, spawning GOP-led probes on Capitol Hill and fueling an eventual impeachment inquiry against the sitting president.
“I would cite the number of times Jesse Watters and Sean Hannity promoted this allegation and made false statements about President Biden on primetime television throughout this time period, but the footnote citations would fill multiple pages,” Sams underscored in his letter to the three top Fox News executives.
But when the FBI informant, Alexander Smirnov, was charged earlier this month with fabricating the bribery allegations against Biden, even apparently confessing that Russian intelligence was involved in seeding the smear, Fox News refused to walk back the story in a meaningful way.
Hannity, the network’s top promoter of the corruption claims, stuck by the narrative that he had promoted in dozens of segments (though he did disclose to viewers that the informant had been charged, spinning the development to attack the media). Elsewhere on the network, Watters used the arrest revelation as supposed evidence of an even deeper conspiracy theory, suggesting Biden was locking up Smirnov in retaliation for revealing the supposed scheme.
And while Fox News’ roster of unscrupulous right-wing hosts have declined to properly correct the record, the outlet’s supposedly non-partisan news website has also failed to update its “EXCLUSIVE” reporting from last summer publicly surfacing the informant’s false claims. Articles by reporter Brooke Singman advancing Smirnov’s bribery allegations remain unaltered on the Fox News website without a correction or mention that Smirnov has been charged with lying to the federal law enforcement about the very claims she reported.
To be clear, credible news organizations would not behave in such a manner. In fact, even before Smirnov was charged, responsible newsrooms viewed the bribery allegations as dubious at best. But Fox News has a poor relationship with the truth, often flooding the discourse with disinformation and conspiracy theories that contort to their audience’s conservative worldview. Last year, the network paid a historic $787.5 million defamation settlement to Dominion Voting Systems for the lies it told about the 2020 election.
Since Fox News has declined to take the responsible course of action and meaningfully correct the record, the White House is now moving to formally request the network do so.
“We feel strongly that all Fox News Digital articles on this topic should at a minimum be updated with editor’s notes informing readers that the source of this allegation has been federally indicted for making it up,” Sams wrote the three top executives. “We also feel strongly that Fox News Channel television personalities like Hannity and Watters, among others, should inform their viewers on air that they have been sharing a discredited allegation from a source who has been federally indicted for making it up.”
But a person familiar with the matter said that Fox News has informed the White House that it does not intend to correct its reporting. And, in a statement the network provided me, Fox News didn’t directly address the White House’s request for it to correct its previous coverage.
“Fox News Media has reported on all key developments since the announcement that Alexander Smirnov was charged with lying to the FBI, featuring the story prominently,” a network spokesperson told me. “We will continue to report on developments in all aspects of the ongoing investigations, hearings, and trials.”
Application of FOX Television Stations, LLC ) MB Docket No. 23-293
for Renewal of License of WTXF-TV, ) Facility ID 51568
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ) FRN: 0005795067
)
)
To: Marlene H. Dortch, Secretary
Attn. Holly Saurer, Chief Media Bureau
INFORMAL COMMENTS OF MILO VASSALLO, ALFRED SIKES, ERVIN DUGGAN, JAMIE KELLNER, BILL KRISTOL, WILLIAM REYNER, AND PRESTON PADDEN
Milo Vassallo, Executive Director of the Media and Democracy Project; Alfred Sikes, Former Republican Chairman of the FCC; Ervin Duggan, Former Democratic Commissioner of the FCC and Former President of the Public Broadcasting Service; Jamie Kellner, Founding President of the Fox Broadcasting Company; Bill Kristol, Former Editor of Rupert Murdoch’s “The Weekly Standard”; William Reyner, Former Lead Regulatory and Commercial Counsel for Rupert Murdoch/News Corporation/Fox; and Preston Padden, Former Executive of Fox Broadcasting Company and Former Lead Lobbyist for Rupert Murdoch/News Corporation/Fox; hereby submit these Joint Informal Comments.
INTRODUCTION
As internal documents and emails produced by Fox make clear, the Murdochs/Fox made a business decision to mislead the American people about the 2020 Presidential election and those false reports, interviews, news segments, and statements had consequences for our democracy and our society. Fox’s actions demonstrate that it lacks the character qualifications to remain a trustee of the public’s airwaves.
NOT ABOUT SPEECH
This proceeding is not about speech. This is about a Murdoch/Fox business decision that had disastrous consequences including (1) the January 6 attack on the Capitol and on police that resulted in injury and death (January 6th defendants are pleading that they suffered from “Foxitis”); (2) vicious attacks on election workers like Ruby Freeman and her daughter in Georgia wrongfully and repeatedly accused on Fox of election fraud; (3) threats against election workers in other States like Michigan which was forced to spend over $8 million on home security for these public servants; (4) attacks on judges and FBI offices and (5) undermining public confidence in the electoral process—actions that “shock the conscience”. Perhaps the most devastating consequence of the Murdochs/Fox presenting and endorsing a knowingly false narrative about the 2020 election is that despite all the evidence to the contrary, millions of Americans still believe that the election was stolen. This consequence will continue to divide Americans and eat away at the fabric of our society for years to come. The FCC cannot look away and pretend that nothing happened. It did. And what happened mattered—a lot!
REPEATED PRESENTATION OF FALSE NEWS
In a 130-page opinion (supported by voluminous record evidence) in the Dominion case[1] Judge Davis found that the Murdochs/Fox repeatedly made false statements—the lies about the 2020 election referenced above. Never in the 89-year history of the FCC has the Commission been confronted with a broadcast license renewal application by an applicant recently found by a Court to have repeatedly made material misrepresentations concerning the election process and the outcome of a presidential election. If the character requirement of the Communications Act means anything, it surely must mean not repeatedly making false statements concerning issues of the highest public importance. Allowing Fox to go unpunished will set a dangerous precedent, especially as we enter a new presidential election cycle in 2024.
NOT ABOUT POLITICS
This proceeding is non-partisan and not about politics. A majority of the former FCC and Murdoch/Fox officials/counsel in our group of Informal Commenters are longtime Republicans (a few recently changed their registration to unaffiliated). And they all—Republicans and Democrats—stepped forward and volunteered to join in this effort based on principle and conviction—not politics.
MISREPRESENTATIONS
This proceeding is about knowing and material misrepresentations. Fox misrepresented the facts of the 2020 election to their viewers, misrepresented to the FCC the facts about WTXF’s compliance with the FCC’s political file rules (stubbornly insisting that WTXF timely filed all contracts when many were not filed until after the commercial schedules had run, defeating the purpose of the Rules), and their supporters have engaged in “scare tactic” misrepresentations about the possible consequences to viewers in Philadelphia of a loss of WTXF’s FCC license.
Leaders of the partisan Koch-funded organization[2], Americans for Prosperity published an opinion piece in the Delaware Valley Journal falsely claiming that the Fox 29 licensing proceeding threatened viewer access to telecasts of Sunday afternoon Eagles NFL games.[3] The story falsely asserted that “failing to renew Fox 29’s license would also deprive Philadelphians of the Eagles’ Sunday games.” As explained in the attached affidavit of former Senior NFL Official Frank Hawkins, this assertion is simply not true. Members of our group have heard the same inaccurate concern expressed by key Congressional staff who declined to reveal who gave them that false impression. An FCC hearing will shed much needed light on all these misrepresentations.
CONNECTIONS BETWEEN MURDOCHS/FOX, FOX NEWS CHANNEL AND WTXF
The Murdochs/Fox try to argue that actions by Fox News Channel are not relevant to determining the eligibility of the Murdochs/Fox for renewal of their FCC license for WTXF. That is simply incorrect.
First, the Murdochs own a controlling interest in Fox Corporation. Fox Television Stations is 100% owned by Fox Corporation. The Murdochs/Fox are the applicant for renewal of the FCC license for WTXF—they are the real party in interest, the party that is in a position to actually or potentially control operations of Fox 29 and Fox’s 28 other FCC-licensed stations.[4] In fact, they stand in exactly the same relationship to the station as they do to Fox News Channel, where Rupert Murdoch acknowledged under oath that he had the power and authority to stop the election lies, but didn’t.
Fox News Channel also is 100% owned by Fox Corporation and produces a weekly program, “Fox News Sunday”, that is broadcast by WTXF. Fox News Channel also produces and distributes to WTXF daily national and international news stories for inclusion, at the station’s option, in WTXF locally produced newscasts.
Under well-established Commission precedent, all actions by a broadcast license renewal applicant—in this case the Murdochs/Fox—and their various subsidiaries are relevant to evaluating their character. In fact, in a 2013 Media Bureau decision involving a Fox Broadcast Station and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, the FCC reiterated that “actions of a licensee’s parent or of affiliated companies” are relevant in reaching Broadcast licensing decisions.[5]
REQUEST FOR DOCUMENTS
The Murdochs/Fox have been required to produce voluminous internal documents relating to false statements Fox made concerning the outcome of the 2020 election in the Dominion and Smartmatic litigations and in response to at least four shareholder derivative lawsuits against Fox and its board including the Murdochs. Those documents obviously are relevant to the issues in this proceeding, already have been digitized, and can be produced by the Murdochs/Fox with almost no effort or burden. To properly evaluate the issues raised in this proceeding, the Commission must grant the Petitioners’ motion and require the Murdochs/Fox to produce those documents to the Commission and to the Petitioners. Not requiring the production of those documents would be tantamount to looking the other way.
NARROW AND LIMITED PRECEDENT
Designating the WTXF application for a hearing would establish only an extremely narrow and limited precedent—namely, that a hearing is appropriate when a broadcast license renewal applicant was found by a court to repeatedly have made false statements and those statements were so insidious and harmful as to “shock the conscience”. Prior to the Murdochs/Fox there has not been one single such case in the 89-year history of the FCC and there is no reason to believe that there ever will be another to which this precedent could apply. Specifically, designating a hearing for WTXF would NOT establish a precedent that could be used by a future FCC (or a President) to threaten the license of a Broadcaster with whose views the FCC (or the President) disagree! As Chris Wallace noted when he left Fox News Channel, opinion of all sorts is fine, but “…when people start to question the truth – Who won the 2020 election? Was January 6 an insurrection—I find that unsustainable.”[6] That is the bright line of distinction between this situation and potential viewpoint-based challenges, and it is an easy one for the Commission to articulate and follow.
THE COMMISSION WILL HAVE MANY OPTIONS AFTER A HEARING
Designating the WTXF application for a hearing is the essential first step. Because of the seriousness of the matter, it is critical that the FCC develop a full record of the facts and motives concerning Fox’s false election narrative. After that, the Commission will have a wide range of options. It could conclude, as it has in other cases, that it is not in the public interest to renew the Murdochs/Fox license for WTXF. Or it could conclude that the record in the hearing justifies renewing the license. Or, it could pursue a middle ground as it has done in other cases, for example a short-term renewal. The point is that the Commission will have many options.
CONCLUSION
Because of the Dominion record evidence (internal Murdoch/Fox emails and texts) the whole world watched the Murdochs/Fox acknowledge the truth that the 2020 election was not stolen, debate the cost in viewers and revenues of reporting that truth to their viewers and make a business decision to lie to them instead. The whole world also watched the tragic consequences of that business decision. Judge Davis called them out on it. The question is what the Commission will do.
From CNN: “Fox’s Reporting Fail: On one of the busiest travel days of the year, with the country in a heightened security stance as millions hit the road and air ahead of Thanksgiving, Fox News recklessly smashed the panic button and stoked fear from coast-to-coast. In the early afternoon, the right-wing network went live with a dramatic report from correspondent Alexis McAdams. McAdams declared that there had just been an “attempted terrorist attack” at the international bridge connecting the U.S. and Canada in Niagara Falls, breathlessly reporting that a “car full of explosives” had exploded at a border checkpoint. That report was placed atop Fox News’ highly trafficked website and sent as a push alert to millions of phones via its app. The network went all in on it, even baselessly speculating on air about Islamic terrorist groups. It was careless — and it was wrong.
As it turns out, there was no car full of explosives. And there was no attempted terrorist attack. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said there had been “no indication” of any such thing. Fox News had made a massive error. The type of error that should have given network brass and the reporters involved a giant pit in their stomach. But unlike respected news organizations that acknowledge when mistakes are made, Fox News has refused to issue a correction. Instead, the network stealth edited its online story, with no editors’ note of any sort. And McAdams went on air, blaming her sources for bad initial information while refusing to accept any responsibility herself for the significant error.
Of course, while McAdams should have acted more responsibly, the entire episode underscores the lack of basic editorial standards at Fox News. Correspondents at news networks are not permitted to run to air with high-stakes reporting based on anonymous sourcing without vetting from senior personnel. And if the inaccurate reporting did somehow slip through the cracks, the network would immediately move to correct it. It was bad that Fox News screamed terrorism in a case where none had occurred. But the network did have an opportunity to own its mistake and be transparent with its audience. It failed on that too.
President Biden says the House Republicans that want to shut down the government are not doing their job. True! But the same is true of every other legislator in the House and Senate. There are no angels in this fight. The Congressional Appropriations process is broken and needs to be fixed.
The only specific responsibility of the Congress mandated by the Constitution is to fund the government. Both Houses of Congress and both parties are failing to properly fulfill this responsibility. Each year Congress is supposed to pass, through regular order, 12 Appropriations Bills before the beginning of the next fiscal year. This process, if followed, allows for robust debate on the individual spending items in each bill. But, as in many prior years, with the start of fiscal 2024 approaching, Congress has passed exactly ZERO of those individual Appropriations Bills.
And so, again as in many prior years, Congress is about to kick-the-can-down-the-road and pass a series of Continuing Resolutions. These Resolutions do not permit robust debate over the merits of most individual spending items. Then, just before the end of the calendar year, Congress will pass an “Omnibus Spending Bill”. This monstrosity will be thousands of pages long. It will not allow for debate on individual spending items. And it will be passed with only a handful of Leaders and Staff having any idea what is in it. It is so huge that most Senators and Congresspersons will not even be able to read it before voting.
Worse yet, these Omnibus Bills become a must pass “Christmas Tree” into which lobbyists will have found a friendly Appropriator to insert legislative provisions with only the most strained and tangential relationship to funding the government. Virtually every lobbyist in D.C. has tried this ploy – I know that I did! And many succeed.
So, I totally agree that it is wrong to shut down the government. Full Stop. Butthe GOP hardliners have a legitimate point. The current process is no way to run the government.
So, what to do? We voters should elect only candidates who agree to (1) insist on passage of all 12 Appropriations Bills each year and (2) agree to support a substantial Congressional pay cut (pick a %) in any year that Congress fails to do so.
For what little it may, or may not, be worth at this point, Preston Padden, Ken Solomon and Bill Reyner wish to express their deep disappointment for helping to give birth to Fox Broadcasting Company and Fox Television that came to include Fox News Channel — the channel that prominently includes news that, in the words of Sidney Powell’s counsel, “no reasonable person would believe.”
How many people can recall, even fathom today, that we were brought up in an entertainment world that offered only three choice of video programming — programming that ABC, CBS and NBC chose and that you could only watch when the networks offered it?
In the 1990’s Bill was lead outside Counsel for NewsCorp/Fox/Rupert Murdoch (“Fox”) and Preston was their lead Washington Lobbyist. Ken was Executive VP of Network Distribution for Fox Broadcasting Company. There was no Fox News Channel on the horizon at the time, and none of us ever worked for that Channel.
With the help of others, Bill and Preston tenaciously defended Fox from attacks alleging Fox’s failure to comply with the foreign ownership restrictions of the Communications Act of 1934, and we obtained for Fox waivers of the FCC’s rules including the Financial Interest and Syndication Rule (“FISR”) and the Broadcast/Newspaper Cross-Ownership Rule. Eventually, the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit confirmed the elimination of the FISR Rule. All of these waivers were critical in enabling Fox to become the long-sought fourth broadcast television network. Out of the ashes of antiquated rules, we were able to help Fox acquire more mass with the acquisition of essential large market VHF television stations and important rights to broadcast NFL games throughout the country.
Ken was instrumental in strengthening the lineup of local broadcast stations affiliated with the new Fox Network. He prepared powerful presentations that persuaded established affiliates of ABC, CBS and NBC to switch to Fox. His efforts were critical to enabling the viability of Fox.
At the time of our work in the 1990’s, we all greatly admired Rupert Murdoch and his vision and bold efforts. We genuinely believed that the creation of a fourth competitive force in broadcast television was in the public interest. Many others thought so also as our waiver requests and other actions on behalf of Fox garnered the support of Democrat and Republican FCC Commissioners and diverse political leaders such as New York Governor Mario Cuomo and Senator Ted Kennedy. Indeed, the development of Fox Broadcasting Company broke the hold that the Big 3 Networks had on US households and opened the gates to unlimited competition for many new sources of programming.
We never envisioned, and would not knowingly have enabled, the disinformation machine that, in our opinion, Fox has become. In a 120 page Court Order, backed by extensive record evidence including voluminous emails from inside Fox, the Judge in the Dominion case found that Fox repeatedly presented false news. Fox did not appeal the decision but instead acknowledged it and paid nearly $800 million in damages to Dominion.
In our opinion, the Fox News Channel has had many negative impacts on our society. Arguably the worst has been Fox’s role in promoting Trump’s “Big Lie” about alleged widespread fraud in the 2020 election and, in our opinion, Fox’s role in contributing to the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol that undermined our democracy. In fact, the connection between Fox and the January 6 attack is so strong that multiple Jan 6 defendants have pleaded not guilty arguing they were suffering from “Foxitis” — a disease caused by watching false news on Fox!
Through months long email exchanges in 2020 and 2021, Preston gained first-hand knowledge of Rupert Murdoch’s thinking about former President Trump and alleged fraud in the 2020 election. Murdoch made it very clear to Preston that he understood that the 2020 election had not been stolen. Nonetheless, during the same time period, Fox continued to perpetuate the “Big Lie” and promote the Jan 6 “Stop the Steal” rally in D.C.
Many other veterans of the historic effort in the 1990’s to break the strangle hold of the Big 3 Networks and to build a fourth competitive force in American television share our resentment that the reputation of the Fox brand we helped to build has been ruined by false news.
We are about to find out whether power or the law is paramount in the United States.
At stake is the local TV empire of Fox Broadcasting and the Federal Communications Act, which requires a character assessment to hold the license to operate a station.
Fox owns 29 TV stations in 14 of the top 15 TV markets in the nation. Each one of these stations is an extremely valuable business, required to operate in the public interest as a condition for the FCC license which allows transmission through the public airwaves.
The Fox-owned station in Philadelphia is up for license renewal. A volunteer citizens group called the Media and Democracy Project is challenging the license over the character clause.
The broadcast license challenge comes from misconduct by sister company Fox News in the mostly unregulated world of cable television. Specifically the $787 million settlement between Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems for Fox’s false reporting alleging programs in the voting machines produced bogus results which made Joe Biden President of the United States.
Discovery in the civil suit against Fox News makes it clear the cable network knew there was no evidence to support these claims but spread them anyway out of fear of losing their audience to other networks even more receptive to the conspiracy thinking.
The top brass at Fox News and Fox Broadcasting are the same, Rupert Murdoch and his son Lachlan.
The unsubstantiated claims on Fox, allowed by the Murdochs, helped inspire the assault on the Capitol Jan. 6, 2021, as thousands of MAGA faithful gathered to “stop the steal” and keep Congress from certifying election results.
If the long-established law behind the FCC character clause has any validity, it must be enforced against Fox Broadcasting where internal documents from the cable news side of the corporation shows that profit comes before truth or the national interest.
Based solely on the facts and the law, Fox does not deserve a license to own a broadcast station.
If the FCC grants license renewals to a station owner that has knowingly and repeatedly reported false news shown to incite violent insurrection against the government, there is no longer any standard of character required by law.
Fox has grown rich and powerful as the network of conservative America and the politicians they support. Applying the law to Fox will be disputed as a political act rather than an unquestioned outcome driven by fact.
For those who would make America great again, the best way to start is by placing standards based in law ahead of financial and political power.
Fox News paid the $787 million judgment like it was pocket change. The FCC character challenge against Fox Broadcast would administer a more significant lesson about the abuse of a public trust and the government-licensed use of the public airwaves.
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