Outgoing FCC Chairman Ajit Pai made one of his final speeches as Chairman to the Media Institute this week. He shared his views on how the FCC has been unable to move its media ownership rules into the modern era due to a rogue group of un-elected officials – the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit – which has gotten in the FCC’s way for years.
The FCC is required, by law, to review and update its media ownership rules every four years. Despite that mandate, the regulations have remained stuck in the past. Pai says broadcasters have been forced to play by rules largely written at the dawn of cable TV, before the commercial Internet, and well before smartphones and social media.
He was determined not to shirk the responsibility. “So back in 2017, the FCC adopted reasonable reforms to bring our regulations more in line with the marketplace. We eliminated the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership ban. We eased the local television ownership rule. And the Commission adopted an incubator program to expand ownership diversity.”
Pai said those decisions were obvious and needed. “Yet once again, they were blocked by the same divided panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit that has commandeered media ownership policy for 17 years. Collectively, this panel’s decisions have frozen in place decades-old ownership restrictions that are absurdities in the digital age.”
However, Pai is somewhat optimistic now that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear the case. “I hope it will affirm the FCC’s common-sense reforms and finally let us bring our rules into the 21st century. I’m glad that on January 19, 2021, my last full day as Chairman of the FCC, the federal government will be fighting to make sure our media ownership rules can match today’s realities—a cause I’ve championed over my eight years at the Commission. In my view, we need a fundamental, intellectually honest re-assessment of what the media marketplace looks like now, where it’s going, and what this means for consumers.”
Pai will be out in Mr. Biden’s administration and the Biden FCC may frown on more consolidation in broadcast ownership….Large corporate ownership consolidation ruined radio as many once knew it…localism is gone, personality is gone, independence is gone, and the OFF switch is the answer to “politically correct” programming.