Trump threatens to revoke licences of US networks for not carrying primetime speech

NEW YORK - Two of the three major US television networks and CNN did not broadcast a prime-time address on July 16 by President Donald Trump on their primary platforms, drawing a rebuke from a president who has placed unprecedented pressure on American media.

The speech focused on election security, four months before the critical midterm elections.

During his speech, Trump said that networks that did not air his speech were engaged in a “plot” and should have their licences revoked.

“In a rare move, NBC and ABC fake news have both said they would not cover this speech,” he said, adding, “Fraud like this should mean a revocation of their licences.”

Networks have broad First Amendment rights to decide what they choose to broadcast, experts say. But historically, broadcasters have carried most such speeches on the grounds that they provide information of public importance.

Late on the afternoon of July 16, a spokesperson for ABC News said the network would run Trump’s speech on its ABC News Live streaming platform and ABC News Radio – not its broadcast channel.

NBC News carried the president’s remarks on its free streaming service, NBC News NOW, but not on its main broadcast channel, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company declined to comment.

In a statement, CNN said it would monitor the speech for news, with a live feed appearing on its website and CNN All Access, its subscription streaming channel.

The ABC and NBC streaming channels generally draw a fraction of the viewers that their traditional broadcast signals reach.

CNN’s digital network is a paid-for service with a smaller audience than its regular cable channel.

In the speech, Trump declassified intelligence that he said showed Chinese interference in US elections, reviving his long-running attacks on election security despite a US intelligence assessment that found no evidence Beijing altered the 2020 vote, which he lost.

Before the speech, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told a press briefing it was “very possible” that Trump would also mention the situation with Iran and the economy at the top of the speech, and could possibly address a range of topics.

She said that is “all the more reason” for the networks to carry the speech live, and for Americans to tune in.

Trump briefly mentioned the US-Israeli war on Iran, which he said the US is winning, and said the US economy was in its best shape ever but focused on his election-security allegations.

Pressure on networks

Trump has spent years sowing doubts about electoral outcomes, falsely claiming his 2020 loss to Democrat Joe Biden was rigged. He has also claimed without evidence that mail-in voting is rife with fraud, voting machines are vulnerable to manipulation and non-citizen voting is widespread.

Some Democrats, including US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, have urged networks not to air the speech, arguing Trump is likely to repeat debunked claims.

CBS preempted its regular programming to air the president’s speech, but before the broadcast, anchor Tony Dokoupil offered an advance rebuttal of what was to be expected.

“Honestly, much of what the president has said on this topic is false,” he said, before adding the reason the network was covering the speech live was because “it will be news, and it is our job to cover the news.”

The network broke off after about 15 minutes to debunk Trump’s claims of election fraud.

Fox News carried Trump’s speech live with some local Fox broadcast affiliates picking up the cable network’s programming, including in New York City.

At CBS, the takeover of Paramount by David Ellison, whose billionaire father Larry Ellison is a Trump ally, has roiled the newsroom and prompted the departure of senior staff from the news magazine 60 Minutes. Some employees have alleged political interference in editorial decisions, which the network has denied.

Ellison is now awaiting FCC approval for Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery, which could give him control of CNN, a network Trump has long criticised for what he says is unfair coverage. The US Justice Department’s Antitrust Division approved the deal in June.

The speech comes at a sensitive moment for US media.

Walt Disney-owned ABC is facing two pending inquiries from the Federal Communications Commission, including one examining whether its daytime talk show The View violated equal-time rules by interviewing a Democratic Senate candidate in Texas.

The FCC could move as early as August to begin the process of withdrawing the licences for Disney’s eight company-owned ABC stations.

Trump has repeatedly attacked NBC and its parent company, Comcast, which he has dubbed “Concast”. In June, he stormed out of an interview with NBC political reporter Kristen Welker after calling the network “a one-sided crooked network”.

Comcast in June announced plans to split into two publicly traded companies through a spinoff of NBCUniversal and Sky. Analysts have said the move could make NBCUniversal an attractive takeover target.

FCC chair Brendan Carr is also investigating Comcast and its NBC unit over its diversity practices, which Carr said were the basis for the decision to speed up the reviews of Disney’s ABC stations.

The conservative-leaning cable news network Fox News, controlled by the family of Rupert Murdoch, generally carries all of Trump’s speeches but may also be wary of this one.

In 2023, the network had to pay out US$787.5 million to settle a defamation suit over its airing of false claims about the 2020 election.

On July 15, Carr said in an interview with NewsNation that he thought the broadcast networks should air Trump’s remarks.

“This is something that the American people have every right to be able to get over the airwaves,” Carr said.

Carr did not immediately respond to a request for comment on July 16. REUTERS