FCC orders review of ABC licenses after Jimmy Kimmel’s Melania Trump joke

The US’s top media watchdog announced on Tuesday that it is accelerating the review of eight local broadcasting licenses used by ABC , in a move critics see as a clear example of political and regulatory retribution against a disfavored broadcaster. The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) announcement comes after the White House launched a full-on attack against the ABC’s late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel , over a joke he made last week about Melania Trump . On Monday, Donald Trump called for Kimmel to be fired over the segment, in which Kimmel said that the first lady has “a glow like an expectant widow”. The joke was made two days before an attempted shooting – allegedly targeting Trump’s administration – interrupted the annual White House correspondents’ dinner. The FCC – led by Trump-appointed chair Brendan Carr – does not grant licenses to national television networks; rather, it licenses each individual station that broadcasts using the public airwaves. ABC owns and operates eight stations, though it has content agreements with many more. Those eight stations – WABC-TV New York, KABC-TV Los Angeles, WLS-TV Chicago, WPVI-TV Philadelphia, KTRK-TV Houston, KGO-TV San Francisco, WTVD-TV Raleigh-Durham and KFSN-TV Fresno – are the ones being targeted by Carr’s FCC. Those stations were not scheduled to have to apply for renewal until 2028 at the earliest and 2031 at the latest. …