Carr Calls for FCC Investigation of Harris' 'SNL' Appearance

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr is calling for an FCC investigation into whether NBC violated the agency’s equal time rules by broadcasting an appearance by Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris’ Saturday Night Live over the weekend. However, the agency, communications attorneys and academics say the network appears to have complied when it provided free air time to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump during major sports broadcasts Sunday. “I think the credibility and integrity of the FCC is on the line here,” Carr said Sunday in an interview on X. But a spokesperson for Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a post on X Monday said, “Our rules do not require that a network seek out opposing campaigns to offer the time,” adding, “the rival candidates have to request it. The requirements outlined under the FCC's ‘equal time’ rules here have been satisfied.”

“We need to keep every single remedy on the table,” said Carr Monday in an interview with Fox Business. “One of the remedies the FCC has ultimately would be license revocation if we find that it's egregious.” The FCC “has received no formal complaints from any legally qualified candidates,” said the agency spokesperson Monday. “Absent any complaints, the FCC will not make any determination regarding political programming rules.” Carr didn’t respond to requests for comment, while his fellow FCC commissioners Nathan Simington, Geoffrey Starks and Anna Gomez all declined comment. Carr said Sunday that every commissioner should weigh in on the matter.

Under the agency’s equal time rules, when a candidate for office appears on a station’s airwaves, opposing candidate(s) for that office must have the opportunity for similar access within seven days. The rules don’t apply to interviews or news coverage. The rules were raised in the past when stations showed movies starring former President Ronald Reagan prior to elections, and they have come up previously in the context of SNL skits starring candidates. The equal time rules don’t require stations to alert opposing candidates to schedule the equal time, but they must file a notice with the FCC announcing the candidate's appearance, Fletcher Heald broadcast attorney Frank Montero told us. The rules are sometimes conflated with the now-defunct fairness doctrine, which required stations covering controversial issues to allow airtime to both sides of an issue.

Harris appeared in an SNL sketch Saturday for roughly two minutes, saying she planned to “end the dramala” as president. Virginia Senator Tim Kaine (D), who is running for reelection, also appeared in a separate portion of the program. Carr posted Saturday night before Harris’ appearance that it was “a clear and blatant effort to evade the FCC’s equal time rule.”

On Sunday, NBC filed equal time notices for Kaine's and Harris’ appearances, and arranged an ad with the Trump campaign. “NBC and Comcast reached out yesterday to give our campaign the opportunity to satisfy the equal time requirement,” emailed a Trump spokesperson Monday. A 60-second Trump ad filmed that day ran during an NBC-televised NASCAR race Sunday and during the post-game show on Sunday Night Football. “We accommodated the Trump campaign’s request for equal time consistent with our regulatory obligations,” said an NBC spokesperson. Although Trump has been a vocal critic of broadcast networks in his online posts in recent months, he hadn’t posted about the equal time issue as of Monday afternoon.

Carr has argued that it is impossible for NBC to offer opposing candidates comparable airtime to SNL before an election and that the appearances so close to Election Day violate the spirit of the FCC’s seven-day rule because opposing candidates will have little time to schedule their appearances. “I don't see how you can cure it,” Carr said Sunday. “I don't see a path forward where you can give someone a comparable time and programming to an SNL audience.” Broadcasters aren’t required to provide candidates identical airtime, merely similar audiences and air time, said Montero. “The mere fact that they can't offer identical equal time, because the program literally only happens once a week, that's not a violation,” he added. “They just have to make a reasonable effort to offer equal time when the candidate requests it.” University of Minnesota media law professor Christopher Terry said the rule has long been interpreted to require only an equivalent audience in demographics and size.

Carr also said the SNL appearances are a violation of FCC rules because NBC also must allow equal time for Green Party candidate Jill Stein and independent candidate Robert Kennedy, who suspended his campaign but remains on many states' ballots, along with Hung Cao, Kaine’s Republican opponent. NBC declined to comment on whether other candidates requested equal time. “Our team has submitted formal requests for equal time as soon as possible,” said Stein in an emailed statement. “I am ready to spread the word of our people-powered agenda at any opportunity."

Cao posted on X: “I was barnstorming in 12 towns and cities across Virginia yesterday talking about how we’re going to secure our border & lower prices, while Tim was being a human punch-line in New York City.” He added, “I want to thank NBC & Tim Kaine for making the contrast so clear about the stakes on Tuesday.” The Kennedy and Kaine campaigns didn’t comment.

The seven-day rule Carr cited requires stations to offer candidates time within seven days of the appearance that activated the equal time rule, not to provide seven days of warning to campaigns, broadcast attorneys told us. It isn’t invoked often since stations commonly reach out to campaigns to arrange their equal-time appearances, even though that’s not required, Montero and Terry said. Since candidates and stations generally work out arrangements, the rules don’t frequently spur penalties, Montero said. It would be extremely unlikely for an equal-time violation to lead to license revocation, he added.

Carr said Monday that violation of the seven-day rule was exacerbated by previous NBC statements that no presidential candidates would appear on SNL in 2024 because of difficulties with FCC rules. “NBC knew the rule and their own public position was that it could not be complied with,” Carr said on X. “Plainly, NBC structured this in a way that does not allow the opposing candidates the seven days in the rule. Our rule does not say that candidates must make snap judgments, on a couple hours’ notice, to exercise their Equal Time rights.”

“It is unfair, even if SNL did so unintentionally, given that NBC is allowed to use public airwaves for free,” Space X CEO Elon Musk posted on X. NAB didn't comment.

It’s unusual for a sitting FCC commissioner to be so vocal so quickly about a matter that could come before the agency, some FCC watchers said. “You have an FCC commissioner who's potentially going to have to rule on a complaint here, who was interjecting himself into the midst of this dispute mere hours after it happened,” Terry said. “Brendan Carr is wrong. He’s clearly and blatantly trying to help [the] Trump campaign. That’s also wrong,” former FCC Chairman Reed Hundt posted in reply to Carr's initial post accusing NBC of violating FCC rules. Free State Foundation President Randolph May said it was appropriate for Carr to have concerns, especially given how close the election is. "The election will be over by the time the FCC adjudicates this," May said. "Based on what I know, it does sound like there could be a violation of the equal time rules." “There’s no grounding” for Carr’s claims in the rules, said Free Press co-CEO Jessica Gonzalez in a news release. “It’s bizarre that a sitting FCC commissioner would engage in such a blatant and wrongheaded attempt to curry favor with a presidential candidate,” she said.