The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has launched an investigation into a San Francisco radio station after it broadcasted details about activity by immigration officials in San Jose, a development that has sounded the alarm for press freedom advocates.
The inquiry into station KCBS, initiated by FCC Chair Brendan Carr, focuses on the station’s reporting on January 26, which included vehicle descriptions and live locations of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in San Jose, California. Press freedom advocates have said that such reporting is protected by federal law, as it concerns the public interest.
Carr, an appointee of President Donald Trump, confirmed in an interview with Fox News that the FCC had sent a letter to KCBS and opened a “formal investigation into [the] matter.”
KCBS has “just a matter of days left to respond to that inquiry and explain how this could possibly be consistent with their public interest obligations,” Carr stated.
The move has sparked concerns among press freedom advocates, who argue that the investigation could have a chilling effect on news organizations as Trump embarks on a mass deportation campaign across the country.
According to the Communications Act of 1934, stations are required to serve the “public interest, convenience, and necessity” when it comes to reporting what’s happening in their communities. Critics of the FCC’s investigation argue that reporting on immigrant detention operations falls within this rule.
“People generally have the right to report this on social media and in print and so on,” said David Loy, legal director of the First Amendment Coalition. “So it’s very troubling because it’s possible the FCC is potentially being weaponized to crack down on reporting that the administration simply just doesn’t like.”
Throughout his political career, President Donald Trump has referred to the media as “the enemy of the people” — and called for news networks to be punished (and targeted by the FCC) after they released factual reports on his actions that portrayed him in a negative light.
Since Trump’s return to the White House earlier this year, several news organizations have capitulated in the face of his continued attacks on the press. Chris Lehmann, D.C. bureau chief for The Nation, has said that news networks downplaying the president’s authoritarianism is the result of “craven corporate misconduct,” citing recent decision-making at ABC News and The Washington Post, which is owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, as an example.
“This is what happens when you have large corporations who are not — they don’t have journalistic values. They don’t have journalistic priorities,” he said in a Democracy Now! interview in January.
Lehmann also condemned Trump for appointing Carr to lead the FCC.
“There’s a very real and immediate danger” with Carr in that position, Lehmann said. “You know, the call will be coming from inside the White House soon, when Trump’s FCC starts implementing policy.”
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