The Federal Communications Commission launched an early review Tuesday of Disney’s broadcast station licenses, an unusually aggressive move that came a day after the president called on Disney-owned ABC to fire late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over another joke.
The process, known as an early license review, will tee up a lengthy legal review of Disney’s eight ABC-owned and operated station licenses, years before they were scheduled for FCC renewal. The commission is responsible for licensing local TV stations to broadcast network-level programming, such as ABC’s, over public airwaves across the country.
But it is highly unusual for the federal agency to file early renewal orders.
Brendan Carr, the Trump-appointed FCC chair, triggered the process shortly after Kimmel once again drew the ire of the administration, this time for comments on his talk show well before a gunman attempted to breach the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.
“Of course, our first lady Melania, is here. Look at her, so beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow,” Kimmel said in a sketch parodying the dinner, two days before the events that upended Trump’s first appearance at the annual gala in Washington.
On Monday, after Kimmel’s clip surfaced, the first lady — who was seated on stage alongside the president when shots were fired Saturday night — denounced the skit as “hateful and violent.” She called on ABC to “take a stand,” but stopped short of saying what actions the network should take.
Her husband, however, was quick to demand ABC fire Kimmel.
Kimmel responded with a statement calling his gag “a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80 and she’s younger than I am. It was not by any stretch of the definition a call to assassination. And they know that.”
Disney allowed “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” to air in its usual weeknight time slot Monday — a departure from the media conglomerate’s handling of the Kimmel controversy last fall over a joke related to the assassination of Charlie Kirk. In that case, the company suspended Kimmel’s show indefinitely before returning it to the airwaves less than a week later.
Recommended
Carr’s decision to drag ABC through a long and resource-draining review process was seen by critics as a means of inflicting the punishment Disney has declined to levy this time around.
The move is “a political stunt and it won’t stick,” Anna Gomez, the FCC’s lone Democratic commissioner, wrote in a post on X after Semafor reported Carr was considering the early review. “Companies should challenge it head-on. The First Amendment is on their side.”
Under the order, ABC must file license renewals for all of its licensed TV stations by May 28.
Regardless of how the review process turns out, it will force ABC to pony up large sums of money and time to defend itself.
“ABC and its stations have a long record of operating in full compliance with FCC rules and serving their local communities with trusted news, emergency information, and public‑interest programming,” a spokesperson for Disney told MS NOW upon receiving the FCC’s order Tuesday.
“We are confident that record demonstrates our continued qualifications as licensees under the Communications Act and the First Amendment and are prepared to show that through the appropriate legal channels.”
Sydney Carruth is a breaking news reporter covering national politics and policy for MS NOW. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at SydneyCarruth.46 or follow her work on X and Bluesky.