Incoming FCC Chairman Brendan Carr Says ’60 Minutes’ Complaint “Likely To Arise” As Part Of Agency Review Of Skydance-Paramount Merger

Brendan Carr, Donald Trump‘s pick to serve as chairman of the FCC, said that the agency would examine a complaint over the way that 60 Minutes edited an interview with Kamala Harris as it reviews the merger of Skydance with Paramount Global, the parent company of CBS.

In an interview with Fox News’ America’s Newsroom, Carr said, “Broadcasters are differently situated to other speakers. They get free access to a valuable public resource, the airwaves, and they’re licensed by the FCC. We take a look at that and we reinvigorate it. There’s also a news distortion complaint at the FCC still, having to do with CBS, and CBS has a transaction before the FCC, and I’m pretty confident that that news distortion complaint over the 60 Minutes transcript is something that is likely to arise in the context of the FCC review of that transaction.”

Carr was referring to the 60 Minutes pre-election interview with Kamala Harris last month. Donald Trump called on CBS to lose its broadcast license because one of her answers was edited with a difference response to one that was shown in an earlier promotion. In fact, the show said, both answers were to the same question, but the one featured on the show was for brevity purposes, commonplace in TV journalism.

Trump filed suit against CBS, and a group, the Center for American Rights, filed an FCC complaint, claiming that 60 Minutes violated the FCC’s news distortion policy. That policy states that action can be taken “if it can be proven that they have deliberately distorted a factual news report. Expressions of opinion or errors stemming from mistakes are not actionable.” The FCC, though, notes that its authority is narrow when it comes to news content, and the agency has rarely sanctioned stations over news programming.

The Skydance-Paramount merger is currently under review. Public interest experts believe that while Carr and other Republican commissioners could add extra delay and expense to the merger review, the network and 60 Minutes would be on solid First Amendment footing when it comes to case law and a court challenge.

The FCC notes in its news distortion policy that in weighing its constitutionality, “courts have recognized that the policy ‘makes a crucial distinction between deliberate distortion and mere inaccuracy or difference of opinion.'”

Carr has previously called on 60 Minutes to release a transcript of the interview. The show has declined to do so.