Newsrooms are shrinking, hedge funds are buying up local papers and clickbait is shaping more and more what you know about the world. What the heck is happening to the news business — and what does this spell for the future of democracy? Journalism professors Jay Rosen and Nikki Usher say the internet isn’t all to blame: Journalists, they argue, need to get more creative about who they reach, what they cover and how they fund their work.
I’m not just referring to the recent controversy between FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, ABC and Jimmy Kimmel. The same chain of events has happened repeatedly in U.S. history.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s FCC chairman, James Lawrence Fly, warned the networks about censoring news commentators.
Then there was John F. Kennedy’s FCC chairman, Newton Minow, who criticized the networks for not airing more news and public affairs programming to support American democracy during the Cold War.
And there was George W. Bush’s FCC chairman, Michael Powell. He decided that a fleeting “wardrobe malfunction” during the 2004 Super Bowl halftime show – when Janet Jackson’s breast was exposed – was sufficient to punish CBS with a fine.
In each of those cases, the FCC represented the views of the White House. And in each case, the regulatory agency was employed to pressure the networks into airing content more aligned with the administration’s ideology.
But what’s interesting in those four examples is that two of the FCC chairmen were Democrats – Fly and Minow – and two were Republicans – Powell and Carr.
As a media historian, I’m aware of the long-existing bipartisan enthusiasm for exploiting the fact that no First Amendment exists in American broadcasting. Pressuring broadcasters by leveraging FCC power occurs regardless of which party controls the White House. And when the agency is used in partisan fashion, the rival party will criticize such politicization of regulation as a threat to free speech.
This recurring cycle is made possible by the fact that broadcasting is licensed by the government. Since a Supreme Court decision in 1943, the supremacy of the FCC in broadcast regulation has been unquestioned.
Such strong governmental oversight separates broadcasting from any other medium of mass communication in the United States. And it’s the reason why there’s no “free speech” when it comes to Kimmel, or any other performer, on U.S. airwaves.
Since its establishment in 1934, the FCC’s primary role in broadcasting has been to authorize local station licenses “in the public interest, convenience, or necessity.”
In 1938, the FCC began its first investigation into network practices and policies, which resulted in new regulations. One of the new rules stated that no network could own and operate more than one licensed station in any single market. This forced NBC, which owned two networks that operated stations in several markets, to divest itself of one of its networks. NBC sued.
In the first serious constitutional test of the FCC’s full authority, in 1943, the Supreme Court vindicated the FCC’s expansive power over all U.S. broadcasting in its 5–4 verdict in National Broadcasting Co. v. United States. The ruling has stood since.
That’s why there’s no First Amendment in broadcasting. The Supreme Court ruled that, due to spectrum scarcity – the idea that the airwaves are a limited public resource and therefore not every American can operate a broadcast station – the FCC’s power over broadcasting must be expansive.
The 1934 act, the 1943 Supreme Court decision read, “gave the Commission … expansive powers … and a comprehensive mandate to ‘encourage the larger and more effective use of radio in the public interest,’ if need be, by making ‘special regulations applicable to radio stations engaged in chain (network) broadcasting.’”
The ruling also explains why the FCC can be credited with having created the American Broadcasting Company. Yes, the same ABC that suspended Kimmel in the face of FCC threats was the network that emerged from NBC’s forced divestiture of its Blue Network as a result of the 1943 Supreme Court decision.
The empowerment of the FCC by NBC v. U.S. led to such content restrictions as the Fairness Doctrine, which intended to ensure balanced political broadcasting, instituted in 1949, and later, additional FCC rules against obscenity and indecency on the airwaves. The Supreme Court decision also encouraged FCC chairmen to flex their regulatory muscles in public more often.
For example, when CBS suspended news commentator Cecil Brown in 1943 for truthful but critical news commentary about the U.S. World War II effort, FCC Chairman Fly expressed his displeasure with the network’s decision.
“It is a little strange,” Fly told the press, “that all Americans are to enjoy free speech except radio commentators.”
When FCC Chairman Minow complained about television in the U.S. devolving into a “vast wasteland” in 1961, the networks responded both defensively and productively. They invested far more money into news and public affairs programming. That led to significantly more news reporting and documentary production throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
In the early 2000s, FCC Chairman Powell promised to “refashion the FCC into an outfit that is fast, decisive and, above all, hands-off.”
Yet his promise to be “hands-off” did not apply to content regulation. In 2004, his FCC concluded a contentious legal battle with Clear Channel Communications over comments ruled “indecent” by shock jock Howard Stern. The settlement resulted in a US$1.75 million payment by Clear Channel Communications – the largest fine ever collected by the FCC for speech on the airwaves.
Powell apparently enjoyed policing content, as evidenced by the $550,000 fine his FCC levied against CBS for the fleeting exposure of singer Janet Jackson’s breast during the Super Bowl. The fine was eventually overturned. But Powell did successfully lobby Congress to significantly hike the amount of money the FCC could fine broadcasters for indecency. The fine for a single incident increased from $32,000 to $325,000, and up to $3 million if a network broadcasts it on multiple stations.
Powell’s regulatory activism, done mostly to curb the outrageous antics of radio shock jocks, resulted in some of the most significant and long-lasting restrictions on broadcast freedom in U.S. history. Thus, Carr’s 2025 threats toward ABC can be viewed in a historical context as an extension of established FCC activism.
Demonstrators hold signs on Sept. 18, 2025, outside Los Angeles’ El Capitan Entertainment Centre, where the late-night show ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ is staged. AP Photo/Damian DovarganesBut Carr’s threat also appeared to contradict his previously espoused values.
As the author of the FCC section in Project 2025, a conservative blueprint for federal government policies, Carr wrote: “The FCC should promote freedom of speech … and pro-growth reforms that support a diversity of viewpoints.” In exploiting the FCC’s licensing power to threaten to penalize speech he found offensive, Carr failed to promote either freedom of speech or diversity of viewpoints.
If there’s one thing the Carr-Kimmel episode teaches us, it’s that more Americans should know the structural constraints in the U.S. system of broadcasting. Media literacy has proved essential as curbs to free expression – both official and unofficial – have become more popular.
When the FCC threatens a broadcaster, it does so in Americans’ name.
If Americans applaud regulatory activism when it supports their partisan beliefs, consistency demands they accept the same regulatory activism in the hands of their political opponents. If Americans prefer their political opposition show restraint in the regulation of broadcasting, then they need to promote restraint when their preferred administration is in power.
The limits of free speech protections in American broadcasting was first published on The Conversation and republished with permission.
Michael J. Socolow is a Professor of Communication and Journalism at the University of Maine
The hunt for the three migrants embodied how advanced technology has become a vital part of the Trump administration's efforts to secure the southern border. This type of drone, previously used in warfare, is operated by the National Air Security Operations division of U.S. Customs and Border Protection at the Army base about 70 miles south of Tucson. A reporter was allowed to observe the operation in April on the condition that personnel not be named and that no photographs be taken.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security allocated 12,000 hours of MQ-9 drone flight time this year at the Fort Huachuca base, and states that the flights cost $3,800 per hour. However, a 2015 inspector general report estimated the cost to be closer to $13,000, factoring in personnel salaries and operational costs. Maintenance issues and bad weather often mean the drones fly around half the allotted hours, officials said.
An MQ-9 Predator B drone prepares for takeoff at the National Air Security Operations Center in Sierra Vista, Arizona. Photo by Steve Fisher/Puente News Collaborative
With the precipitous drop in migrant crossings at the southern U.S. border, the drones are now tasked with fewer missions. That means they have the time to track small groups or even individual border jumpers trekking north through the desert, including a father and child.
The drone flying this day was mounted with radar, called Vehicle and Dismount Exploitation Radar, or VaDER, that could identify any moving object in the drone’s sight, and pinpoint them with color-coded dots for the two analysts in the first container. The program had already located three Border Patrol agents, one on foot and two on motorcycles, searching for the migrants. The analysts had also identified three cows and two horses, headed towards Mexico.
Then, one of the analysts spotted something.
“We got them,” he said to his colleague, who had been scanning the terrain. “Good work.”
The analyst dropped a pin on the migrants, and the VaDER program began tracking their movement in a blue trail. Now, he had to guide agents on the ground to them.
“We've got an adult male and a child, I think, tucked in this bush,” the analyst radioed to his team, as he toggled between the live video to an infrared camera view that shows the heat signature of every living thing in range. The analyst saw his Border Patrol colleagues approaching on motorcycles.
The roar of the oncoming machines scared up a bird, the tracking program showed. The migrants began running.
“OK, it looks like they're starting,” the camera operator radioed to the Border Patrol agents. “They’re hearing the bikes. They hear you guys.” The camera operator and the other personnel spoke in the professional, matter-of-fact tone of 911 operators.
One adult and the child began scrambling up a hill. “They’re moving north and west, mainly,” the camera operator said. “Starting to pick up the pace going uphill.”
VaDER GMTI imagery output from a CBP MQ-9. Image courtesy of U.S. Customs and Border Protection
The agents rushed in on the pair and detained them. It was a mother and her child. The drone team turned its attention to the third person, who was stumbling through the brush and making a beeline for the Mexican border.
“If you cut due south from your current location,” the drone pilot said to the camera operator. “You should pick up some sign.”
The camera operator, as directed, panned across the desert, scanning farther and farther south.
“I’ve got them,” he said when he spotted someone running. He radioed the coordinates to the Border Patrol team. By now, the man, carrying a backpack, had scaled a hill.
“He’s on the ridge line right now, working his way up due south, slowly,” the camera operator radioed.
Then the man dropped something.
“Hey, mark that spot,” the camera operator said. “He just threw a pack, right here where my crosshairs are at.”
Agents would go back later and see if the backpack contained drugs, an analyst said. “Usually, if it’s food or water, they’re not going to do that,” he said.
On this spring morning, the drone wasn't the only airborne asset deployed. A helicopter had joined the chase to catch the southbound man, who stumbled, got up, and kept running.
“He took a pretty good spill there,” an analyst said into the radio.
“We have help inbound, three point five minutes out,” the camera operator said.
A helicopter came into the drone’s view. It swooped in, circling the location of the man, who was by now hiding under a bush.
“You just passed over him,” the camera operator radioed the helicopter pilot. “He’s between you and that saguaro.”
With a keystroke, he switched to infrared vision to find the man’s heat profile through the brush to make sure he still had him.
Guided by the camera operator, the pilot landed the helicopter in a cloud of dust near the cowering target. The video feed showed agents jump out of the aircraft, detain the man, and load him into the helicopter. The chopper lifted off and tilted back north towards a nearby Border Patrol post.
“Thanks, sir, appreciate all the help,” the analyst said to the helicopter pilot.
Mission accomplished, the drone pilot turned the MQ-9 back along the U.S.-Mexico border, scanning the vast desert in search of more migrants. The military is planning to deliver a third MQ-9 drone to the base this fall after spending a year retrofitting it for civilian authority use.
MQ-9 Predator Drones Hunt Migrants at the Border was first published by palabra and republished with permission.
Steve Fisher is a Puente News Collaborative correspondent, covering security issues in Mexico.
This article was edited by Steve Padilla, Column One Editor for the Los Angeles Times.
S4 E13. Broken News