FCC asks court to reject Disney lawsuit over ABC stations’ licenses

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is asking a federal judge to toss a lawsuit brought by Disney and ABC over the agency’s move to call several of the network’s local stations for early license renewal.

In a filing with the court made public Thursday, lawyers for the FCC argued the Disney suit is premature and obstructs what it characterized as a necessary part of its investigation into the company’s diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) hiring policies.

Disney contends the commission is attempting to stifle its First Amendment rights on the basis of the content broadcast on ABC.

“This would only hobble the Commission’s efforts to investigate and resolve serious allegations that Disney has engaged in unlawful discrimination, and from otherwise ensuring that Disney’s stations are serving the public interest,” the agency wrote in its filing. “Plaintiffs, in return, would only free themselves from the burdens of proving their case in administrative proceedings.”

Disney sued the FCC last month after the commission called the licenses of several local stations in major markets across the country up for renewal, an unusual move that unsettled press freedom activists and some elected Democrats.

It followed months of tension between the Trump administration and one of the country’s largest broadcasters, which wrote in its complaint that the FCC under President Trump has sent a “message to every media company in the country” — that they should “tell only the stories the Administration deems favorable, or face the coercive machinery of the federal government.”

“In such a world, the press could in no way be described as free,” the company wrote. “The FCC Chairman has left little doubt that this is his goal.”

In a statement to The Hill, an FCC spokesperson said, “Disney filed a meritless lawsuit in an effort to stop the FCC’s ongoing investigation into allegations that Disney violated the law.”

“The FCC has developed a voluminous record, and it will continue to follow the facts and the law wherever they lead,” the spokesperson continued Friday. “As the FCC’s motion to dismiss shows, Disney filed its meritless case in the wrong court at the wrong time based on erroneous legal and factual assertions.”

FCC Chair Brendan Carr, a frequent critic of mainstream media outlets, has questioned whether ABC is using airwaves regulated by the agency in the “public interest” and called for the firing of the network’s late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over jokes he made about the president and the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

He has separately vowed to investigate major media companies over their DEI initiatives, defending his department’s investigation of those practices.

“The balance of equities and the public interest just as clearly weigh against enjoining the Commission’s investigation. Broadcasters are highly regulated parties subject to the Commission’s comprehensive oversight,” the FCC wrote as part of its filing this week.

“Licenses grant them exclusive access — awarded for free — to highly valuable portions of the electromagnetic spectrum, an important and finite public resource,” it added.