Media Research Center writer Nicholas Fondacaro is obsessed with hate-watching “The View” and rages that it refuses to peddle right-wing talking points. So he was more than happy to learn of lawfare against the show, courtesy of the Trump administration. He gleefully touted in a Feb. 6 post:
On Friday, Fox News reported that the Federal Communications Commission was launching an investigation into ABC’s The View following the appearance of Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico (TX). The agency cited an alleged violation of the equal time statute that mandated the broadcast networks’ non-news shows to allow all legally-filed political candidates to have equal time on their shows.
The show also recently hosted Talarico’s primary opponent Representative Jasmine Crockett (TX) on January 6.
NewsBusters crunched the numbers and found that The View gave Talarico one segment of airtime that was just under 10 minutes (9:47) long. Meanwhile, they gifted Crockett a total of three segments that totaled over 17 minutes (17:39).
As NewsBusters had previously noted in our reporting of The View’s legal notes, and more recent lack thereof, the show liked to thinks of itself as just the editorial pages of the metaphorical newspaper that would be ABC News.
This would make the show exempt from the “statutory equal opportunities requirement” the FCC announced it wanted to enforce last month.
But the FCC didn’t seem to be buying what The View was selling.
Fondacaro didn’t explain what the difference is between this and another form of biased content on publicly owned airwaves: right-wing talk radio.
Tim Graham was upset that the New York Times defended “The View” — while also bragging that the Times talked to the MRC about it — in a May 10 post:
On Friday, The New York Times published what was basically a press release for ABC lawyers headlined “ABC Accuses Government of Violating First Amendment.” They accused the FCC of a “chilling effect” for daring to investigate The View on equal-time grounds.
That doesn’t take much of a probe. It’s obvious that show is a unanimous hootenanny dedicated to trashing Trump and the Republicans. It has zero interest in equal time as a principle.
On Saturday, The Times posted a more balanced article titled “How ‘The View’ Landed at the Center of a Free Speech Battle.” Times reporter Jim Rutenberg talked to us about the show:
[…]We weren’t quoted talking about how the show is a feverish anti-Trump mess with no pushback. There’s no opposing view even saying “I’m not sure Trump is Hitler.” Instead, The Timesasserted “The show’s panel has long included a conservative presence to balance the progressivism of its longstanding hosts Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg.”
In reality, the most adversarial co-host was Meghan McCain, and they viciously drove her off the set.
When the Times pointed out ABC’s argument that the Trump administration cannot use “the coercive powers of the state to punish viewpoints with which they disagree,” Graham huffed:
Merely investigating this program’s contents is not “coercive” or punitive. It’s ABC that punishes dissenting viewpoints. The View suggested conservatives usually don’t live up to their “certain caliber of guest.”
These people often don’t live up to being serious. The Times could have included Nick Fondacaro’s routine findings that the show unloads crazy disinformation, like Whoopi Goldberg claiming racists are still siccing dogs on black voters at polls in the South, or their ravings that Donald Trump is going to cancel elections and refuse to leave the White House.
Liberal journalists were fine with Big Tech banning Donald Trump accounts for “disinformation,” and none of them found First Amendment lawyers to scream “chilling effect.” They were fine with the Biden administration censoring opposing views all over the place, even creating a “Disinformation Governance Board.” They’re only free-speech warriors for their own speech.
Graham also failed to explain why “The View” must be punished while right-wing talk radio gets a pass.
Fondacaro returned for a May 22 post quoting his favorite FCC commissioner:
“Is The View a ‘bona fide news interview program’?” FCC Chairman Brendan Carr asked the public in Friday X post announcing that the Federal Communications Commission was opening public comment on Disney’s petition demanding a ruling in their favor. Disney’s argument hinges on the determination that The View, a bastion of liberal conspiracy theories and anti-conservative hate-mill, was actually just a “bona fide news” show and nothing less.
“Disney has filed a petition with the FCC asking the agency to declare that The View is exempt from the statutory equal opportunities requirements that would otherwise apply to broadcast shows,” Carr wrote. “Disney argues that The View qualifies as “bona fide news” under the law, comparing itself to Meet The Press or Face The Nation.”
[…]The Public Notice itself noted that “When considering the scope of an exemption related to a specific program, the FCC has long sought to ensure ‘that the content, format and participants not be intended for the political advantage of candidates.’” It seemed to also point out a flaw in Disney’s argument that exposed how The View would not qualify as “bona fide news”:
As noted above, KTRK and ABC argue in their Petition that The View qualifies as a bona fide news interview program under FCC precedents. The companies also suggest in their Petition that they believe the federal equal opportunities statute itself would not survive First Amendment scrutiny today or at least if it is applied today to The View would not survive any such review.
As before, Fondacaro refused to explain why “The View” must be punished while right-wing talk radio remains free of government interference.