Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr on Wednesday denied the government censored CBS “Late Show” host Stephen Colbert after the network forbid him from airing an interview with a U.S. Senate candidate earlier this week.
“There was no censorship here at all,” Carr told reporters.
Instead of censorship, Carr blamed Texas state Rep. James Talarico (D) of committing a “hoax” related to CBS not airing his interview.
“You had a Democrat candidate who understood the way the news media works and he took advantage of all of your, sort of, prior conceptions, to run a hoax, apparently for the purpose of raising money and getting clicks,” Carr claimed. “And the news media played right into it.”
The “hoax” claim doesn’t appear to be factually supported, however: Colbert first brought up the censorship to his audience Monday, not Talarico.
“We were told in no uncertain terms by our network’s lawyers ― who called us directly ― that we could not have [Talarico] on the broadcast,” Colbert said Monday.
“Then I was told, in some uncertain terms, that not only could I not have him on, I could not mention me not having him on,” Colbert added. “And because my network clearly doesn’t want us to talk about this, let’s talk about this.”
(Photo by John Nacion/Variety via Getty Images)/(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Colbert proceeded to explain that the FCC, under Carr, has threatened to require late night TV talk shows to give equal time to every political candidate in a race, and it appears CBS decided to comply in advance. (Notably, Trump’s FCC has not threatened to apply the same rule to right-wing talk radio.)
“Now, as I said, at this point, he’s just released a letter that says he’s thinking about doing away with the exception for late night,” Colbert said. “He hasn’t done away with it yet, but my network is unilaterally enforcing it as if he had … but I want to assure you, this decision is for purely financial reasons.”
Colbert accused CBS of caving to threats on Monday, saying the network told him not to interview Talarico on his show.
Colbert said CBS discouraged Talarico as a guest, seemingly fearing the FCC would impose an equal-time rule that hasn’t previously been used for late-night talk shows. Talarico is running against Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) in the Democratic primary for a U.S. Senate seat.
Talarico’s interview instead aired on the “Late Show” YouTube channel, where it quickly amassed millions of views. The campaign also said it raised $2.5 million within 24 hours after the interview aired.
In his press conference Wednesday, Carr claimed that Congress passed the equal-time rule so “the media elites in Hollywood and New York” can’t “pick the winners and losers in primaries.”
“There was one partisan candidate who fed this slop to the mainstream national news media and you guys ran for it,” Carr said. “I was just laughing, it was clear this story was going to turn at some point and the truth was going to come out.”