In a series of furious late-night posts on his social media platform, Donald Trump raged that both ABC and NBC “should lose their Licenses” because of their supposed unfair coverage of him, adding that “they should pay up BIG” for broadcasting on American airwaves.
The latest anti-media tantrum from the president, who recently extracted a $16 million settlement from CBS over a “meritless” lawsuit just weeks before his administration approved a mega-merger involving the network’s parent company, appears to have been sparked by comments made by ABC News commentator Chris Christie – a former Trump ally turned critic.
“Despite a very high popularity and, according to many, among the greatest 8 months in Presidential History, ABC & NBC FAKE NEWS, two of the worst and most biased networks in history, give me 97% BAD STORIES. IF THAT IS THE CASE, THEY ARE SIMPLY AN ARM OF THE DEMOCRAT PARTY AND SHOULD, ACCORDING TO MANY, HAVE THEIR LICENSES REVOKED BY THE FCC,” Trump blared on Truth Social in a Sunday night post. “I would be totally in favor of that because they are so biased and untruthful, an actual threat to our Democracy!!!”
In a subsequent online rant, the president called ABC and NBC “FAKE NEWS” while wondering why the “absolute worst and most biased networks” in the world weren’t “paying Millions of Dollars a year in LICENSE FEES” before calling for his FCC to strip the broadcast licensing rights from their stations.
“They should lose their Licenses for their unfair coverage of Republicans and/or Conservatives, but at a minimum, they should pay up BIG for having the privilege of using the most valuable airwaves anywhere at anytime!!!” Trump fumed. “Crooked ‘journalism’ should not be rewarded, it should be terminated!!!”
Hours before calling for retribution against the two broadcast networks, Trump groused online about an ABC News segment featuring Christie and threatened to re-launch an investigation of the former New Jersey governor over the 2013 Bridgegate scandal. The president also decided to take a jab at ABC News anchor Jonathan Karl over his hair.
“I just watched Sloppy Chris Christie be interviewed on a ratings challenged ‘News’ Show, ‘This Week With George Slopadopolus,’ on ABC Fake News (By the way, what the “hell” happened to Jonathan Karl’s hair? He looks absolutely terrible! It’s amazing what bad ratings, on a failed television show that was forced to pay me $16,000,000, can do to one’s appearance!),” Trump wrote in the unhinged post, referencing the payoff ABC’s parent company Disney gave him to settle a lawsuit over a George Stephanoupolous interview.
“Can anyone believe anything that Sloppy Chris says? Do you remember the way he lied about the dangerous and deadly closure of the George Washington Bridge in order to stay out of prison, at the same time sacrificing people who worked for him, including a young mother, who spent years trying to fight off the vicious charges against her,” the president added. “Chris refused to take responsibility for these criminal acts. For the sake of JUSTICE, perhaps we should start looking at that very serious situation again? NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”
In the end, Christie wasn’t charged with any crimes over the bridge closure – which had been seen as political revenge over a New Jersey mayor not endorsing Christie – and denied any knowledge of the incident. Two of his top aides were convicted of fraud and conspiracy, but the Supreme Court ended up overturning those convictions in 2020.
During an appearance on Sunday’s broadcast of This Week, Christie took issue with Trump’s FBI raiding the home of the president’s former national security adviser John Bolton, who – like Christie – has become an outspoken critic of Trump in recent years.
“I think it’s kind of funny to hear the president talk the way he does about Bolton and classified information, yet, when he had classified information, the same rules didn’t apply,” Christie said during the telecast.
“Donald Trump sees himself as the person who gets to decide everything. And he doesn’t care about any separation,” he added. “In fact, he absolutely rejects the idea that there should be separation between criminal investigations and the politically elected leader of the United States. This is much different than it’s ever been run before.”
Christie also noted that this should not come as much of a surprise to the public, as “you were told this” would be what Trump would do if he became president again. “He told you he was going to do this, that he was going to have a Justice Department that acted as his personal legal representation. And that is what they’re doing,” Christie noted.
Meanwhile, this is also far from the first time that Trump has threatened to use the FCC – which is led by his handpicked chief Brendan Carr – to enact punishment on media companies for not giving him obsequious coverage.
Before CBS News paid Trump to settle his lawsuit over the editing of a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris, which is now being investigated for potentially violating anti-bribery laws, Carr opened a review of complaints that the network had engaged in “news distortion.” The president also threatened CBS with “substantial punishment” this past spring over a separate 60 Minutes broadcast, warning that the network would “pay a big price” for the newsmagazine’s segments on the Ukraine war and the president’s annexation threats against Greenland.
Carr has also taken swings at both ABC and NBC in recent months.
This past March, for instance, Carr told Fox News that ABC could lose its broadcast licenses over an investigation into Disney’s diversity hiring practices. “If the evidence does in fact play out and shows that they were engaged in race- and gender-based discrimination, that’s a very serious issue at the FCC, that could fundamentally go to their character qualifications to even hold a license,” Carr said at the time.
Weeks later, Carr accused Comcast of “news distortion” because its cable news network MSNBC refused to call wrongly deported immigrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia a “violent” MS-13 gang member. Once again, Carr suggested that the NBC parent may have violated its broadcasting licenses over the way its networks had covered the Abrego Garcia case.
While Trump and his FCC chair have repeatedly dangled threats of license revocations, investigations and lawsuits over the heads of mainstream news networks unless they soften their coverage of the administration, one broadcaster has been spared – conservative cable giant Fox News.
Immediately after Trump took office, Carr reinstated a bevy of new bias complaints against ABC, NBC and CBS that had been dismissed by then-FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel in January ahead of her resignation. One complaint that he did not revive, however, was against Fox-owned WTXF-TV in Philadelphia.
That complaint, which the Media and Democracy Project filed, alleged that the claims laid out in the Dominion Voting System defamation case – which Fox News settled for a whopping $787.5 million – showed that owners Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch didn’t have the “character” to hold broadcast licenses.
Besides receiving almost universally glowing coverage from Fox News, Trump has used the right-wing network as something of a staffing agency – hiring roughly two dozen former Fox employees for roles within his administration.
Still, the president has expressed his disdain with the MAGA channel from time to time, whether it is over on-air pundits and correspondents not displaying unwavering loyalty to him or the network’s “biased” polling firm reporting approval numbers that Trump doesn’t like.
Additionally, the president is currently suing Rupert Murdoch – his on-again/off-again friend – for $10 billion after the Wall Street Journal, which is owned by Murdoch’s News Corp., reported on an alleged “bawdy” birthday letter that Trump sent deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in 2003. Trump has vehemently denied writing the card, calling it a “fake thing.”
