Rep. Doris Matsui (D-CA), the top Democrat on the House Energy and Commerce’s subcommittee on communications and technology, said that the FCC’s merger approval “is not a serious effort to support local news or address the challenges posed by Big Tech. This is about handing power to a few massive corporations at the expense of local voices—the very voices that hold power accountable.”
She also cited Nexstar’s decision to pull Jimmy Kimmel off the air last year, after FCC chairman Brendan Carr warned stations following a comment the late-night host made about the aftermath of the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
Rep. Matsui said that “now the same companies that folded under that pressure are being rewarded with a multi-billion-dollar merger. That’s not coincidence. That’s government pressure—and it’s unacceptable. If an agency can ignore clear statutory limits because it ‘wants to,’ then no law is safe.”
Nexstar’s CEO Perry Sook thanked Trump, along with Chairman Carr and the DOJ, for the merger’s approval. The company had lobbied aggressively to secure approval for the transaction, while urging the agency to relax its ownership rules permanently.
Nexstar said Thursday that it had closed its acquisition of Tegna following approvals from the FCC and the Justice Department.
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