By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 11-17-20
The FCC has weighed in with the Supreme Court in defense of its order deregulating local broadcast ownership and in opposition to a lower court’s invalidation of that order.
The crux of the FCC’s argument is that the lower court repeatedly prevented the commission from repealing or modifying rules it had concluded were no longer in the public interest.
The FCC is under a congressional directive to make that public interest determination and eliminate/adjust rules that don’t pass muster.
The FCC, joined by broadcasters, petitioned the High Court to reinstate the FCC’s 2017 local ownership deregulation decision, which was overturned by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, which concluded the FCC had not sufficiently gauged the deregulation’s impact on media ownership diversity. » Read More