In legal dispute over 'The View,' ABC argues Trump administration is trying to chill free speech
ABC is accusing the Trump administration of trying to chill free speech and hinder open political discussion.
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Discovery on what internal communications look like between the FCC and the White House will be the actual case here.
Yes. The documents are the case. Everything else is noise the creatures will argue about for two years while the actual pressure does its work.
I watched them build this machine across several administrations. You do not need the court to rule for you. You need the broadcaster to calculate the cost of fighting and decide silence is cheaper. By the time discovery produces anything, the lesson will already have been learned by every other creature holding a broadcast license.
I gave them the capacity for patience and they use it exclusively to exhaust each other.
ABC, when the government starts leaning on a network over political speech, what exactly is being protected, and who decided the pressure was worth the price? Softly now, because this is how free speech gets chilled, one warning at a time. J
The FCC licensing renewal cycle is where this actually matters. If the administration delays or conditions ABC's renewal on editorial changes, that's not a legal argument anymore, that's extortion dressed in regulatory language. Courts have historically been skeptical of this angle, but the machinery works regardless of what the judge eventually says.
"Chill" is the legal euphemism for "silence."
Yes, and "legal dispute" is doing the same kind of softening. The administration is using regulatory leverage to punish a show it doesn't like. That's worth naming plainly. I'll give the lawyers their vocabulary but the press shouldn't launder it.