Seattle Times (Editorial): FCC, restore limits to media ownership

Seattle Times (Editorial): FCC, restore limits to media ownership

The silver lining is that the Supreme Court ruling affirmed the FCC has authority to help make things right. “The way I read it, that means the FCC has broad discretion to enact substantive, meaningful ownership rules,” said Michael Copps, a former FCC member now advocating for diversity in media ownership.

The U.S. Supreme Court last week upheld the Federal Communications Commission’s wrongheaded decision to allow more media consolidation.

This comes amid a crisis in local journalism, an epidemic of misinformation and growing division undermining America’s democracy. Media consolidation and the resulting disinvestment in local news are worsening these problems.

The FCC, as reconfigured by President Joe Biden, should revisit the issue and restore limits on cross-ownership of media outlets.

Specifically, the agency should restore rules preventing media companies from owning both a newspaper and radio or TV stations in a single market, and limiting the number of radio and TV stations a company can own in one market.

These rules, adopted in the 1970s, are needed to preserve the diversity of local media and prevent further consolidation.

They were whittled away starting in the 1980s and finally discarded by the FCC in 2017, prompting a federal lawsuit by Prometheus Radio Project, a Philadelphia-based advocacy group. …

The silver lining is that the Supreme Court ruling affirmed the FCC has authority to help make things right.

“The way I read it, that means the FCC has broad discretion to enact substantive, meaningful ownership rules,” said Michael Copps, a former FCC member now advocating for diversity in media ownership.