As @agomezfcc.bsky.social notes, the public interest standard is not a nebulous test to control content or to let the FCC ignore the First Amendment. #FCCOversight
And, we’re done. 3 hours and 23 minutes. Really wish I’d had any coffee before I got here.
Closing out on the Dem side is @kevinmullin.house.gov who asks Carr if he will commit to not punishing broadcasters for their editorial decisions. Carr won’t say yes. #FirstAmendment #FCCOversight
Carr meekly suggests that providers *may* still send multilingual emergency alerts. Sure, but why would the FCC move to eliminate assurances that they actually will and must send them? #FCCOversight
Waiving on are full committee members @reppaultonko.bsky.social and a few others. He is concerned by Carr’s threats to free speech and his “cruel” rollback of school connectivity. @agomezfcc.bsky.social notes some students spend 4 hours a day on now disconnected school buses. #FCCOversight
The real way to “level” the playing field would be to take away exclusive licenses to speak on a slice of the public airwaves, if it’s really true that broadcasting isn’t special. Is there something preventing Nexstar from having websites and apps like social media does?? #FCCOversight
Obernolte trots out the laughable notion that we are handicapping broadcasters by, what? Continuing to give them exclusive use of broadcast spectrum?? Guess what: broadcasters can also reach 100% of the (connected) population online if they want to. #FCCOversight
Carr’s repeated lies or at least implications that real wireless prices came down because of something he did is infuriating. #FCCOversight
As @agomezfcc.bsky.social clarifies for the record to @mcclellan.house.gov — guess what Brendan, there are four TV broadcast networks, including Fox and the now Trump captured CBS. And he “local” broadcasters seeking mergers are giant conglomerates too, Nexstar and Sinclair. #FCCOversight
New to subcommittee @mcclellan.house.gov proclaims her nerdy love for the FCC, then pivots to Virginia’s founders’ views on freedom of expression, before discussing @agomezfcc.bsky.social First Amendment tout where she’s heard bipartisan concerns over this FCC’s threats. #FCCOversight
A great defense of Section 230 from @robinkelly.house.gov, who says rightly that Trump has made it harder for private platforms to fact check and to moderate content as the #FirstAmendment permits. @agomezfcc.bsky.social agrees the FCC has no jurisdiction to police online speech. #FCCOversight
An incredibly messy question from Houchin lets Carr do culture war again — the FCC’s role apparently is to defend America from “New York and Hollywood” — and to suggest that “local stations” programmed by conglomerates in Baltimore and Texas somehow serve specific communities’ values. #FCCOversight
And as @reptroycarter.bsky.social notes, Louisiana was first and ready to go on BEAD, and then the Trump admin has delayed another full year — all to promote worse and less future-proof technologies. Governors in both parties in LA were ready to move on BEAD, but no. #FCCOversight
@freepress.bsky.social is in the House hearing room this morning for the #FCCOversight hearing featuring a lying FCC Chair and @agomezfcc.bsky.social, the hero who has spent the entire last year holding Brendan Carr accountable.
Follow @mattfieldwood.bsky.social for live coverage.
@reptroycarter.bsky.social takes his turn to slam Carr for making people in this country fear government retribution for expressing their views, then pivots to talk with @agomezfcc.bsky.social about the importance of wifi and uses of spectrum that don’t require an FCC license. #FCCOversight
It’s a joke, but not a funny one, when GOP members blame Biden for loss of spectrum auction authority. Civics quiz: who passes the laws? Hey guess what, it’s Congress, which was in GOP hands in the House in 2023-2024; and where Ted Cruz killed the deal from the Senate minority. #FCCOversight
Amazing. Now @menendez.house.gov *demolishes* Carr by asking how many of these “public interest” investigations the FCC has launched over coverage of Democrats. Carr simply evaporates. #FCCOversight
Great pull from @menendez.house.gov that Carr wrote in Project 2025 that the FCC is independent, which even that Carr dances around. Then Menendez details the precise timeline around Carr scrubbing the FCC’s website retroactively during Carr’s exchange last month w/ @lujan.senate.gov. #FCCOversight
Continued hard-hitting #FCCOversight from the Republican majority: “Chairnan Carr, what was the coolest or scariest gadget you saw at the consumer electronics trade show in Vegas?” 🤦🏻♂️
Powerful from @usrepkathycastor.bsky.social, speaking directly to Carr:
“Corruption in the open is no less odious. American taxpayers deserve so much better.” #FCCOversight
A return to reality from @usrepkathycastor.bsky.social, who talks with @agomezfcc.bsky.social about Carr ripping away school bus and home connectivity from students; and details the Paramount bribes to Trump, preceding its interference in CBS News and 60 Minutes stories. #FCCOversight
Everybody got it?
Brendan says broadcasters have different obligations….
But if any Dem ever asked about a broadcast license, THAT was a threat.
Which is it, Brendan??
#FCCOversight
Does Brendan even listen to his shitty non-sequiturs?? He starts his answer justifying censorship with the platitude that broadcasters are different under the law from other speakers; then ends by saying Dems were evil and bad to take certain actions against certain broadcasters. #FCCOversight
Another rotten softball from GOP’s Pfluger to Carr on what the public interest for broadcasters means to him. He says that it was the Dems who threatened media — NOTABLY FAILING to answer about or justify his own threats. #FCCOversight
As @repgreglandsman.bsky.social asks Carr whether his threats to broadcasters are just to please Trump or if Carr actually believes this stuff, Carr (yet again) dithers & says broadcasters have a “public interest duty.” Implying that this duty is never to critique a sitting president. #FCCOversight
Rep. @repgreglandsman.bsky.social does a nice job tying together the conditions that Carr and Trump demanded from Skydance to get their Paramount merger approved, with the Ellison family’s Oracle no-bid contracts with the Trump administration. Quid pro quos abound. #FCCOversight
Carr just said in one of the wildest lies I have ever heard in a hearing room that “Disney and Comcast are providing almost 100 percent” of the programming that Americans get. Even if he meant on broadcast, that’s insane. Never Fox, of course! Just the evil woke ones. #FCCOversight
Dear Rep. Cammack: I am sorry to inform you that most of your constituents back home are NOT watching this hearing, nor are they impressed by the fight against robocalls. #FCCOversight
This is maddening from Cammack. She insults her colleague for daring to cut off Carr’s attempt to shout over a congresswoman; then repeats Carr’s lie that wireless prices are down because of anything Donald Trump did. They removed a thousand regulations, and prices came down. Magic! #FCCOversight
Great job by @repbarragan.bsky.social noting Carr proposals to remove providers’ obligations to provide information in other languages too, besides just English. As @agomezfcc.bsky.social tells her, companies should compete on quality, not on who can hide info from customers best. #FCCOversight
And @repbarragan.bsky.social takes Carr to task on his rollback of broadband transparency rules, and excoriates him for failing to answer clearly whether consumers a c her constituents have a right to know about a $750 early termination fee. #FCCOversight
