Whoopi Goldberg, Sara Haines, Joy Behar, Neve Campbell, Sunny Hostin, Amanda Carpenter on The View Jeff Neira/ABC The View finds itself in the middle of a political battle, and this week could be the next test of it.
On one side is the powerful Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Brendan Carr (at a White House event Friday, President Trump called him “Perhaps the most powerful man in this room … He is trying to make the ‘Fake News’ real and respected again”), as well as some skittish ABC affiliates wary of attracting the commission’s wrath.
On the other side is The Walt Disney Co., ABC and The View itself, which is arguing that as a news program it should be allowed to book the guests it wants to book, and interview newsmakers without government interference.
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An appearance on today’s show by Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) will once again bring that battle to the front burner, even if it appears to avoid the incident that sparked an FCC investigation. And as the November midterm elections get closer, it may become more glaring for The View if abstains from or decides to book candidates, particularly in closely contested House or Senate races.
To back up for a moment, in February, the FCC under Carr, opened an enforcement action into the ABC daytime panel show, over its decision to interview Democratic Senate hopeful James Talarico on the Feb. 2 installment of the program.
At issue is Carr’s move to change the guidance on the FCC’s “equal time” provision, which requires that broadcasters accommodate all legally qualified candidates for office in programming. There is an exemption for “bona fide” news programs, and the FCC has argued for decades that late night and daytime talk shows have qualified for that exemption. Until now.
News of the FCC investigation leaked the week after Talarico’s appearance, and as one TV news veteran noted to The Hollywood Reporter, “the politicians disappeared” from the program.
Indeed, a review of The View’s guest bookings going back six months show that political guests were a common occurrence (putting aside December, when the holidays interrupted the regular programming), including appearances from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, and John Sen. Fetterman.
Politics were still a frequent hot topic of the conversations ever day, of course, but the guest lists conspicuously shifted, with actors, authors and filmmakers filling the guest lists, and political figures absent.
In fact Jackson, on Feb. 10, was the last political guest to appear on the show … until today, when The View welcomed Booker (D-NJ) to talk about his new memoir Stand. Booker is widely expected to cruise to reelection this year, but New Jersey has a primary in June, and Booker has multiple opponents (all of them longshots).
Will Booker’s appearance trigger an expanded FCC investigation? Probably not, as the deadline to submit signatures for candidates is Monday afternoon, meaning that Booker’s appearance will likely sneak in under the wire before he becomes a “legally qualified” candidate.
A source close to the show emphasized that The View, in hosting Talarico, Booker and other political guests, is just doing what is has always done, which is discuss the news of the day with the newsmakers of the day. The show hasn’t changed, they say, going back to the Barbara Walters days.
But even if Booker’s appearance evades the FCC’s scrutiny, the commission is closely watching TV talk programs, with The View in particular a subject of interest.
Carr, speaking at a Breitbart News event March 10, addressed the investigation: “We have an enforcement proceeding underway right now where Disney is continuing to maintain and defend that The View is a bona fide news program,” he said. “That’s not a position that is uniformly agreed to even within the broadcast community.”
Indeed, a review of FCC political files shows that most ABC affiliates in Texas filed “candidate appearance” notices with the Commission, after Talarico’s appearance as required under the equal time rules. Some, like Nexstar-owned WFAA (Dallas) and KIII (Corpus Christi), wrote that the “notice is without prejudice regarding the determination of whether the foregoing appearance qualifies for any exemption” under the rules. Others, like Sinclair-owned KVII (Amarillo), note that he “appeared without charge,” adding up the number of minutes and seconds he was on screen.
Ultimately, if a qualified political candidate appears, it will be up to the local stations to help make good on any equal time requirements, and the owners of those stations appear acutely aware of the uncertain political environment.
There was one major ABC station in Texas that did not file an appearance notice: KTRK (Houston) which is owned by ABC itself. Given the company’s argument to the FCC that The View is a bona fide news program, no such notice would be necessary.
But Carr, who clearly has his eyes set on the show, is looking to make an example out of the network to prove his point around his “bona fide” news push.
“Congress was clear that the FCC has a role with respect to bona fide news, because otherwise, I think the statutory history is clear,” Carr said during a January press conference. “They were worried that TV programmers would broadly take advantage of trying to claim they were bona fide news when they weren’t. But if you’re fake news, you’re not going to qualify for the bona fide news exception.”
And while his push has resulted in some odd bedfellows (Gigi Sohn, a progressive former FCC commissioner nominee, has called for using the rule to pursue actions against conservative talk-radio stations), it is Carr’s show, and while The View is the focus of his attention right now, there’s no reason Colbert, or Jimmy Kimmel, or The Tonight Show couldn’t be next, especially with the 2026 elections heating up across the country.
“The FCC is right to insist that ABC follow through on its legal obligation to give equal opportunities to all candidates,” says Daniel Suhr, president of the conservative Center for American Rights. “ABC and other networks can no longer pretend that these left-wing entertainment shows are somehow actually news programs. Chairman Carr is on solid ground in law and precedent to insist that ABC give all candidates an equal opportunity to make their case to voters.”
But the wildcard may be the station owners themselves, including the newly-empowered and enlarged Nexstar, which swallowed TEGNA last week (legal challenges notwithstanding), who can apply pressure of their own on their network partners. While the boycott of Kimmel over his controversial comments last year ultimately didn’t stick, if they fear that airing a show would put them in the FCC’s orbit, they may prefer to preempt first and ask questions later.
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