FCC Deletes Online Description as an 'Independent' Agency in Real Time as Carr Faces Senate
The FCC drew controversy Wednesday by removing a description of it as an “independent” U.S. agency from its online mission statement in the middle of a Senate Commerce Committee hearing where commission Chairman Brendan Carr faced questions on the agency's role under President Donald Trump. During the hearing, Carr sparred with sometimes-hostile panel Democrats on his media regulatory actions, including his mid-September threats against ABC and parent Disney, which were widely perceived as bringing about the network’s since-reversed decision to pull Jimmy Kimmel Live! off the air (see 2512170070).
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The FCC changed its mission statement shortly after Communications Subcommittee ranking member Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., pressed Carr on whether it was “factual [or] a lie” that the website at that time described the commission as an “independent U.S. government agency.” Lujan had told Carr that if the mission statement “is lying, then you should just fix it.” The Congressional Research Service described the FCC in a June report as an “independent federal agency.”
“With the change in Administration earlier this year, the FCC’s website and materials required updating,” an FCC spokesperson said in an email. “That work continues to ensure that they reflect the positions of the agency’s new leadership.”
Carr told Senate Commerce that he believes the FCC “is not formally an independent agency.” Democratic Commissioner Anna Gomez countered his characterization, arguing that the commission remains an independent agency.
Lujan said in an interview that Carr lied to the House Communications Subcommittee during a 2022 FCC oversight hearing (see 2203310060) by telling the subpanel in written testimony that he believed what was then a 2-2 tied commission was “an independent expert agency.” Sen. Andy Kim, D-N.J., first pointed out the discrepancy during the Senate Commerce hearing Wednesday. “That’s just one example of where he’s not being honest [with Congress, and] I would say lying violates” congressional rules, Lujan told us.
Shifting 'Viewpoint'
Carr argued that he based his 2022 agency independence “viewpoint” on an assumption that courts would find that the 1934 Communications Act still allows the president to fire commissioners only for cause, based on the Supreme Court’s embattled 1935 Humphrey’s Executor v. U.S. precedent limiting dismissal of commissioners at independent agencies. The FTC stopped referring to itself as an independent agency earlier this year.
“I think now it’s clear that that’s not the case,” since there’s been a “sea change,” Carr said. The Supreme Court appears poised to overturn Humphrey’s Executor by upholding Trump’s firing of FTC Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter (see 2512080047). Carr wouldn’t say whether Trump is his boss or if they have talked about going after the president’s critics. But Carr did acknowledge that Trump can fire him. Kim countered that “Trump is not your boss. The American people are your boss.”
Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin was among other Democrats who invoked general concerns about the FCC's independence. She criticized Carr for using the commission's reviews of media deals to “force companies to enact policies favored by the Trump administration,” noting that the FCC approved Skydance’s $8 billion purchase of CBS owner Paramount Global in July after the network reached a $16 million settlement of Trump’s lawsuit over its editing of a 60 Minutes interview last October with former Vice President Kamala Harris (see 2507020053).
Lujan told us he doesn’t expect that Congress will hold Carr accountable for his “gobbledygook” explanation of his shift on FCC independence and other matters while Republicans hold majorities in both chambers. “There was no accountability today” from Senate Commerce Republicans, Lujan said. “I don’t know that [Carr] is going to stick around to [face pushback] once there’s a Democratic president in office.”