Trump's FCC chair plays coy on Fox News when asked if president involved in Colbert's cancellation
Carr's ambiguity regarding whether Trump was directly involved in the decision to end a long-running program hosted by an outspoken critic of the president comes amid CBS parent company Paramount's pending merger with Skydance Media, which the FCC chief is responsible for approving.
Trump's hand-picked top media regulator also took the opportunity on Thursday to say that it's 'entirely possible' that ABC's The View could be in the administration's 'crosshairs' after the White House called View host Joy Behar an 'irrelevant loser' while suggesting 'her show is next to be pulled off air.'
Interviewing Carr on Thursday morning's broadcast of America's Newsroom, Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer stated that CBS was still reeling from the fallout from the sudden announcement that Colbert's show will come to an end next year. Hemmer also noted that CBS morning anchor Tony Dokoupil recently broke from his network colleagues – who believe the decision was politically motivated – and defended his corporate bosses.
At the same time, Hemmer kicked off the interview with Carr by saying he wanted to get something 'out of the way,' and that was whether Trump had 'anything to do with the cancellation of Stephen Colbert's show.' The Trump official, however, played coy with his response.
'What is important to keep in mind is when President Trump ran for election, he ran right at these legacy broadcast media outfits and the New York and Hollywood elites that are behind it, and he smashed the facade that they are gatekeepers that control what Americans can think and what Americans can say,' Carr responded.
'Once you do that, you have exposed a business model of a lot of these outfits as being nothing more than a partisan circus. So I think there are a lot of consequences that are flowing from President Trump deciding, I won't play by the rules of politicians in the past and let these legacy outfits dictate the narrative and terms of the debate,' he continued. 'He is succeeding.'
Carr then went on to suggest that even if Trump hadn't played a direct role in the cancellation of Colbert's show, the president's ongoing war with the legacy media was the key factor in the decision.
'Look at what is happening. NPR has been defunded, PBS has been defunded, Colbert is getting canceled,' the chairman boasted. 'You've got anchors and news media personalities losing jobs downstream of President Trump's decision to stand up. He stood up for the American people. The American people don't trust the legacy gatekeepers anymore.'
Hemmer, meanwhile, pointed out that he had asked Carr 'a very direct question,' but 'did not hear a yes or a no in your answer.' Instead, as the Fox anchor noted, he 'heard a maybe.'
Carr's non-committal response comes two days after Skydance's general counsel sent him a pair of letters confirming that New Paramount will eliminate all diversity, equity and inclusivity (DEI) policies and hire an ombudsman to review 'complaints of bias' at CBS News once the merger is complete.
Additionally, Carr also met with Skydance CEO David Ellison days before it was announced that Colbert was leaving and The Late Show franchise would come to an end. At the meeting, according to regulatory filings, Ellison asked Carr to 'promptly grant' Paramount's request to transfer over its broadcast licenses while promising CBS would be 'unbiased' under the new corporate leadership.
The Ellison meeting also took place shortly after Paramount agreed to pay Trump $16 million to settle his 'meritless' lawsuit over a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris, leading Democratic lawmakers and free press groups to threaten lawsuits and criminal investigations into whether Paramount violated anti-bribery laws with the settlement.
Colbert himself has called the payoff a 'big fat bribe' in order to help push the merger through, and he has since cast doubt that his show's cancellation was based on a 'purely financial decision,' as Paramount insisted in its announcement. CBS staffers agree with this sentiment. 'Many of us think this was part and parcel of the Trump shakedown settlement,' one network staffer told The Independent.
Besides celebrating the Late Show's cancellation, Trump has also repeatedly claimed that he reached a side deal with Skydance as part of the settlement, asserting that Ellison has promised him as much as $20 million in pro-Trump advertisements and PSAs on CBS programming once the merger is complete. Paramount has denied knowledge of any secret behind-the-scenes arrangement with the incoming owner.
Elsewhere in the Fox News interview, Hemmer read the White House's recent threatening message to The View, wondering if this meant that the ABC daytime talk show – which is well-known for its anti-Trump stance – is 'now in the crosshairs of this administration.'
Carr, who is seen as a MAGA 'attack dog' and loyal foot soldier in Trump's onslaught against the mainstream media, suggested he could soon be taking aim at the show.
'Look, it's entirely possible that there's issues over there,' he replied. 'Stepping back, this broader dynamic [that] once President Trump has exposed these media gatekeepers and smashed this facade, there are a lot of consequences. I think the consequences of that aren't quite finished.'
Asked where this could end, Carr said that 'we need a course correction' and it's 'time for America's' legacy broadcasters to return to promoting the public interest.' He then applauded Skydance for committing to eradicating diversity hiring initiatives and hiring an ombudsman before, adding that 'that's where we have to go.'Notably, Carr's remarks about The View come months after he opened an investigation into ABC and its parent company Disney – which paid Trump $16 million last year to settle a defamation suit – over its DEI policies, claiming that the corporation may have violated the FCC's equal employment opportunity regulations.
And earlier this year, it was reported that Disney chief Bob Iger explicitly asked The View's hosts to tone down its anti-Trump rhetoric and pull back on political segments.
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