ABC Makes Huge Realization About Their Devil's Bargain With Trump

The company’s court filing underscored just how dangerous Trump’s assault of free speech is as the midterms approach.

ABC finally fired back a response to the F.C.C.’s threat to revoke its TV licenses, calling it what it is: a blatant attack on free speech.

F.C.C. chair Brendan Carr called for a review of the broadcasting licenses, allegedly in response to ABC’s diversity and inclusion programs. But the threat came on the heels of some jokes Jimmy Kimmel told that angered the president.

The company’s court filing said, “The retaliation against ABC is a signal to every media company in the country: Accommodate the administration’s view of what news coverage should look like or pay the price.”

The irony is, ABC already “paid the price.” Last year, the company shelled out $16 million to settle a meritless libel lawsuit with Trump. I called that what it was: a bribe. Now, a little over a fiscal year later, ABC seems to be looking at the books and realizing that the ROI on that move is turning out to be less than zero.

I will never understand why these huge corporations refuse to acknowledge objective reality: paying Trump doesn’t buy you anything. All it does is teach him that you’re willing to pay, and next time, he’ll get you to pay more. ABC probably thought last year’s settlement was an investment in favorable treatment by the Trump administration. But they got the same bang for your buck as an investment in anything Trump slaps his name on. Trump Steaks, Trump University, Trump Bibles, Trump Watches… they’re all scams. Why would this be any different? ABC is learning this now, the hard way. Too bad they didn’t figure it out $16 million ago.

This fight with ABC is a sideshow to the main event: it’s just one more front in Trump’s war on free and fair elections. The F.C.C. is threatening to pull broadcast licenses in eight local markets: New York, L.A., Chicago, Philadelphia, Houston, San Francisco, Raleigh-Durham, and Fresno. These are huge media markets. Cutting them off from one of the few major news providers ahead of the midterms makes it that much harder for voters to make informed decisions about who to cast a ballot for in November.

The reason for all this is obvious: Trump is scared. He knows he can’t win this election on the merits, so he’s trying to rig the game. Going after the media is of a piece with his other obsession: passing the SAVE Act, which would gut voting rights and make it much harder to vote. When you can’t win fairly, you try to win unfairly.

I feel like a broken record calling this textbook authoritarianism, but it’s important that we continue to call it out when we see it. And that’s not just symbolic; there’s evidence that it actually makes a difference. Just Security reported this week that challenging an authoritarian regime’s information control - censorship and clamping down on free speech - is actually more effective than sanctions, diplomacy, and military exercises.

The single most important thing a regime needs to do to survive is to control the narrative. That’s why in Russia, you see journalists murdered and disappeared. In China, they throttle the internet. In Iran, they crack down on protests. Autocrats do not mess around when it comes to neutralizing threats to the approved narrative.

And those countries absolutely hate when they get called out on it. Just Security’s report showed that criticizing Russia’s media censorship ratcheted up state-sponsored propaganda there even more than conducting military exercises. That’s just how important it is for these autocrats to control the narrative.

So Trump is showing his ass here. It’s obvious that the reason he’s siccing Brendan Carr on ABC in an attempt to take their news off the air is to prevent anything he doesn’t like from being reported. He needs to control the narrative, or he risks losing the election. And he knows it.

In the meantime, while ABC learns a lesson that they should’ve understood 18 months ago, independent media continues to serve as an effective bulwark against this administration. I have now been on Trump’s enemies list for nearly two months, but unlike legacy media, I will never capitulate to this White House. I answer solely to readers like you who demand more of those with platforms than kowtowing to autocrats for self-preservation.