WASHINGTON – The head of the Federal Communications Commission pushed back Wednesday against claims that federal regulators forced CBS to block a political interview on Stephen Colbert’s late-night program, while also announcing an official probe into ABC’s daytime talk show “The View.”
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr verified that his agency has launched an enforcement action to determine whether ABC’s popular morning program broke federal equal time regulations regarding political candidate appearances.
The controversy began when Colbert revealed Monday that CBS attorneys prevented him from broadcasting a sit-down interview with James Talarico, a Democratic state lawmaker from Texas seeking his party’s U.S. Senate nomination. According to Colbert, network legal teams made this decision following updated FCC guidelines issued in January that removed previous exemptions for daytime and late-night talk shows from equal time requirements when featuring political candidates.
