FCC Chairman Responds to Disney’s Claim The View Is ‘Bona Fide News’

Nicholas Fondacaro
May 22nd, 2026 3:30 PM

Text to Speech

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“Is The View a ‘bona fide news interview program’?” FCC Chairman Brendan Carr asked the public in Friday X post announcing that the Federal Communications Commission was opening public comment on Disney’s petition demanding a ruling in their favor. Disney’s argument hinges on the determination that The View, a bastion of liberal conspiracy theories and anti-conservative hate-mill, was actually just a “bona fide news” show and nothing less.

“Disney has filed a petition with the FCC asking the agency to declare that The View is exempt from the statutory equal opportunities requirements that would otherwise apply to broadcast shows,” Carr wrote. “Disney argues that The View qualifies as “bona fide news” under the law, comparing itself to Meet The Press or Face The Nation.”

 

 

“The FCC is now seeking public comment on Disney’s request to be labeled as ‘bona fide news,’” Carr added as he explained what it all meant and that the public had a say:

Under FCC case law, tv shows do not qualify as “bona fide news” if their decisions are based on partisan purposes, such as an intention to advance or harm an individual’s candidacy.

As the Public Notice observes, Congress originally passed the equal opportunities law to prevent media gatekeepers from deciding the outcome of elections.  The law, even when it applies, does not prohibit anyone from having any candidate appear on any show.  Rather, Congress intended it to empower voters with more information and encourage more speech.

The Public Notice itself noted that “When considering the scope of an exemption related to a specific program, the FCC has long sought to ensure ‘that the content, format and participants not be intended for the political advantage of candidates.’” It seemed to also point out a flaw in Disney’s argument that exposed how The View would not qualify as “bona fide news”:

As noted above, KTRK and ABC argue in their Petition that The View qualifies as a bona fide news interview program under FCC precedents. The companies also suggest in their Petition that they believe the federal equal opportunities statute itself would not survive First Amendment scrutiny today or at least if it is applied today to The View would not survive any such review.

As a 2025 NewsBusters study proved, the so-called “bona fide news interview program” had a really hard time balancing their liberal and conservatives guests. The study found that The View spoke politics with 128 liberal guests to just two who represented a conservative viewpoint.

According to the most recent NewsBusters study about their 2026 guests (published April 10), The View continued their imbalance to the tune of 27 liberal to one conservative.

 

 

As NewsBusters had previously noted in our reporting of The View’s legal notes, and more recent lack thereof, the show liked to thinks of itself as just the editorial pages of the metaphorical newspaper that would be ABC News.

Moderator Whoopi Goldberg had even been very vocal on the show that their role was to push Democratic Party propaganda. During an appearance on the show by sports commentator Stephen A. Smith in 2025, Goldberg argued with Smith about the Democratic Party’s efforts in messaging themselves to voters in 2024 and defended The View’s role in that effort:

SMITH: [Y]ou're talking about what he's doing. But before you brought that up you brought up the message that the Democratic Party was disseminating. I'm challenging you on that. That is not what they were doing.

GOLDBERG: Oh, yes, it was. I was here. We did it.

Also in 2025, Goldberg agreed with Democratic Governor Tim Walz (MN) that they were the Democratic Party.

 

 

The public comment was open until June 22, 2026 and reply comments were due by July 6, 2026.

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