By Lisa Baertlein
LOS ANGELES, Sept 12 (Reuters) – An ESPN interview on Saturday with a Republican U.S. senator did not violate the Federal Communications Commission’s equal-time rule, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said, days after the agency issued a warning to another network about a Democratic political candidate’s appearance on a late-night TV program.
Responding to a social media post by a group of college Democrats, Carr wrote that equal-time rules, which require TV networks to give airtime to opposing candidates, do not apply to Senator Ted Cruz’s appearance on ESPN’s “College GameDay” program because the law applies to broadcast TV stations, not cable programs.
Additionally, the statute only applies to legally qualified candidates, which Cruz is not, he said. Cruz, a Texas Republican, is not a candidate in this year’s midterm elections.
ESPN did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Carr’s post came days after his agency warned one of ESPN’s sister networks, ABC, over late-night TV host Jimmy Kimmel’s interview with James Talarico, a Democratic candidate for Texas’ other U.S. Senate seat.
“Congress wanted to ensure that voters would decide elections, not media gatekeepers picking winners and losers by providing preferential airtime to some candidates and not others,” Carr wrote on Saturday.
Kimmel on Thursday aired his interview with Talarico on YouTube rather than on his network broadcast, citing the FCC threat. Talarico is running against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican, in a race that could decide control of the U.S. Senate in November.
In January, the Republican-led FCC said daytime and late-night TV talk shows are no longer considered “bona fide” news programs that are exempt from equal-time rules.
Cruz earlier this year criticized an FCC decision to review broadcast licenses held by Walt Disney, the parent company of ABC and ESPN.
“It is not government’s job to censor speech and I do not believe the FCC should operate as the speech police,” he told Punchbowl News in comments confirmed by his office.
(Reporting by Lisa Baertlein; Editing by Sergio Non and Kim Coghill)
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