FCC’s Brendan Carr draws fire for shredding the First Amendment in Paramount-Skydance merger conditions

FCC Chair Brendan Carr is subject to a takedown by the Verge for The FCC's controversial approval of the Paramount-Skydance merger. Critics—led by the Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF)—allege that Carr’s actions trample the First Amendment, using station licensing and merger-approval.

Filed with the DC Court of Appeals, the FPF complaint accuses Carr of enforcing an unprecedented merger conditions, including mandating the new media company appoint an ombuds to verify programming includes “viewpoints across the political and ideological spectrum”—a directive with no legal precedent in FCC regulations. The backdrop is a $16 million settlement that Paramount paid to former President Donald Trump prior to merger approval, following his lawsuit alleging media bias over a 60 Minutes interview editing incident.

Carr’s endorsement of CBS’s cancellation of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”—and his implication that public interest obligations require broadcasters to align with certain political viewpoints—has sparked fears any programming critical of Trump could be targeted. This follows other merger approvals, such as Verizon-Frontier, conditioned on eliminating DEI. Critics underscore that broadcast regulation, even under the historic Fairness Doctrine, never imposed such sweeping political content mandates.