By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON, Oct 29 (Reuters) – Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr said on Thursday that broadcast networks should use “due diligence” before airing polls that could have been fabricated but he did not identify any specific broadcasts that raised concerns.
Earlier this month, Carr warned broadcasters they could violate their regulatory obligations by airing “entirely fake polls and suppression polls” ahead of the November 3 midterm elections.
President Donald Trump, whose poll ratings have slid to their lowest ever and whose Republican Party is trailing in polls ahead of the midterm elections, has pressured Carr to crack down on US broadcasters and journalists. Democratic FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez said the drive to cast doubt on polls was an attempt by the administration to get TV news operations to censor themselves.
On Thursday, Carr said he was not seeking to punish broadcasters for airing poll results that are negative for any specific politician, but cited recent cases including that of Wedgewood Polling, which admitted it had faked surveys.
“Given this rash of entirely fake polls, we think it’s important that broadcasters are diligent,” Carr said. He said he was not seeking to impinge on “good faith reporting on existing polls.”
Carr said he was unaware of any specific instances of broadcasters airing fake polls. He said people should come forward if they had concerns that stations had aired fabricated polls.
Trump has repeatedly rejected polls and surveys showing Democrats are significantly ahead of Republicans in the midterm congressional elections. The president has called on Carr to punish journalists, including NBC’s Kristen Welker, but Carr has not done so.
“I think it’s fake polls. Polls mean something but a lot of the polls are rigged,” Trump said last week.
Gomez, the sole Democrat on the three-member commission, said broadcasters cannot be punished for airing news about polls under the agency’s rules governing news distortion or hoaxes. Gomez suggested it was a “way to spook stations into self-censoring.”
Carr in April ordered an unprecedented early license review for all eight of Disney’s company-owned ABC TV stations. A court challenge is pending and Carr said again Thursday he had made no decisions on whether to seek to revoke the licenses.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by David Gregorio)
