• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, 5 hours ago

Broadcast stations get to renew their individual FCC licenses every eight years.

But taking away licenses? In reality, that is a very difficult task. 

Recently, there have been perceived threats from Federal Communications Commissioner Brendan Carr, with regard to issues over news distortion and hints of license removals.

The problem is in proving any of this. Producing evidence of attempts to falsify the new reports and stories requires whistleblowers, memos, and on-the-record executive with knowledge of efforts telling journalists to deliberately distort news.

But this doesn’t mean the Trump Administration and FCC don't have other means of influence -- such as when it considers approval of business merger deals or other potential agreements.

We have seen this recently as Nexstar Media Group, the largest owner of U.S. TV stations, completed a $6.2 billion deal to buy major TV station owner Tegna. The deal received approval last week from the FCC.

This came despite the FCC's own limitation on U.S. station ownership with a maximum 39% reach of the U.S. TV households. The FCC issued a waiver of that rule for Nexstar-Tegna.

On the flip side, the FCC and the Department of Justice’s Antitrust unit could pressure other deals. 

The Trump Administration, according to many analysts, had favored Paramount Skydance buying Warner Bros. Discovery, but was less favorable toward a Netflix deal to buy WBD.

At the center of this was CNN, owned by WBD. The Trump Administration has been critical of CNN news reports. 

CNN doesn’t need a license to operate. But there are other ways to influence executives as well as other news organizations. 

The Trump Administration sued both the parent companies of ABC News and CBS News for what it perceived as mid-leading reports of “news distortion.” Those suits were settled with $15 million and $16 million settlements respectively.

So while broadcast license removals may not come to pass, there are other tools the Trump Administration may use to influence news organizations.