Media Consolidation

Americans understand intrinsically that one fundamental freedom that makes this country great is our right to free speech and our right to hear a diversity of views. In today's society, these diverse views are disseminated primarily by the media on publicly owned airwaves. I believe that our democracy is strong partly because this media diversity which necessarily allows public dissention regardless of which party is in power, while even a diverse media at times may end up succumbing to "group think" and failed to express dissention. A less diversified media will surely be more likely to carry the prevailing opinions of the moment and fail to help enlighten society. Not only would our democracy be weaker if such expressions were not allowed, but it would be a great disservice to the American people if one could not find diverse expressions on the airwaves.

The issue of media consolidation has risen to a prominent level in policy discussions recently as a result of the actions of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and its Chairman, Michael Powell. The FCC has attempted to further deregulate the media ownership rules. The FCC, led by Powell, issued new regulations designed to allow large media conglomerates to own and control more news sources and a larger share of our public airwaves. This policy change would effectively allow fewer and fewer people to control a larger and larger share of an individual media market, including allowing newspapers companies and broadcast TV stations to share the same owner, thus homogenized the views expressed by the media.

The media consolidation rules that the FCC has pushed will benefit the few, powerful media conglomerates that can afford to buy more than a reasonable share of a particular market at the expense of the American people's access to a variety of view-points. Our airwaves are owned by the American taxpayers, and our longstanding rules on their ownership has traditionally ensured local ownership, a diversity of voices, and kept open the channels of public accountability.

The FCC's new rules for media ownership can be broken down into the following four basic categories:

1. Deregulation of the Broadcast Newspaper Cross-Ownership Rule: This policy prohibited a daily newspaper and a broadcast TV station from being owned by the same company within the same media market. As a result of the FCC's changes, a newspaper like the Seattle Times could now be bought by a large broadcast company, like Clear Channel, thereby reducing localism in Washington State.
2. Deregulation of the Dual Network Rule: This rule prevented one of the four major networks -- ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX -- from buying another network. Under the FCC's deregulation of this rule, it would now be possible for a network such as FOX to buy NBC or CBS outright.
3. Deregulation of the National TV Ownership Rule: This policy limited the number of TV stations that a single media company can own. The previous limit prevented any single company from controlling stations that collectively reach 35 percent of all TV households.
4. Deregulation of the Local TV Multiple Ownership Rule and the Radio TV Cross-Ownership Rule: Previous to the FCC's actions, this rule limited the number of stations that any single company can own within a single community.

To stop the FCC rule changes, I have joined with a few of my colleagues to lead in the fight in Congress to prevent the proposed rule changes from taking effect. With my support, the House passed an amendment to H.R. 2799, the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2004 that would reinstate 35% ownership cap for television stations. During the debate on H.R. 2799, I introduced the Hinchey-Price-Inslee amendment which would have reversed the FCC's proposed cross-ownership rule changes. Unfortunately, this amendment failed to pass the House by a vote of 174 to 254.

The hard work that went into getting the House to pass H.R. 2799 with the provision reinstating the 35% ownership cap for television stations was eventually undercut by the Republican leaders of the House and Senate. Because the Republican majority in Congress was unable to pass the appropriations bills individually, they resorted to passing an omnibus appropriations bill that rolled many bills into one. During the process of agreeing what legislation both the House and Senate would support, known as a conference committee, the Republican leadership stripped the language from the bill reinstating the 35% ownership cap for television stations. Instead, they reached a "compromise" that allowed the cap to be set at 39%. They reached that exact percentage to give cover to the media companies that had already exceeded the 35% cap (Viacom and NewsCorp/FOX already reach 38.8% and 37.7% respectively).

In an effort to push the issue of media consolidation into the forefront of policy debate, I authored an op-ed piece for the Seattle Times expressing my concerns with the proposal. I also testified before the FCC to voice my opinion and the opinion of many Washington State residents that the FCC should not allow more media mergers. Nationwide, the FCC received more than 2.3 million comments on the proposed media deregulation rules with 99% of the comments opposed to the FCC's position.

Despite the overwhelming public opposition to the relaxing media ownership rules, the FCC under Chairman Martin has moved forward with rules to do exactly that. In response to these efforts, I have introduced H.J. Res 79, a resolution of dissapproval of the FCC's action. If passed into law, H.J. Res. 79 would roll back the FCC rule changes. Unfortunately, President Bush opposes my resolution and would veto HJ Res 79 if it reached his desk

While working to stop the FCC's efforts to make it easier for massive media conglomerates to consolidate their power, I have also been working on legislative ideas to address media consolidation. I believe that any legislative remedy must include a strong statement relating to the need to reassess our approach to media consolidation and to start protecting the people's interests in their airwaves and in print. I believe the time has come for the FCC to start this process over and come up with a set of rules designed to encourage localism, diversity, and competition in the broadcast media instead of always waving the green flag for more big media consolidation.

I believe that we need to encourage more public input and participation in any efforts to change the way the public's airwaves are regulated. The FCC rule-making process did not involve enough public hearings despite the clear interest in the activities of this otherwise relatively obscure federal agency. Congress, in addressing this issue, should compel the FCC to hold a large number of public hearings, solicit input from all broadcasters, media owners, and public officials. I also believe that Congress should closely monitor the FCC's activities and publicly oppose and "dark-of-night" rulemaking. The bottom line is that the American people own the public airwaves and to a certain extent the strength of our democracy depends on ensuring that those airwaves include a diversity of views. That public ownership must always be accompanied by an understanding by the government that the public interest should be at least as important as the corporate interest in deciding what to do with our airwaves.