Brendan Carr Confirms FCC Has Started ‘Enforcement Proceedings’ Against ‘The View’

Martin Holmes February 19, 2026, 8:02 am

What To Know

FCC chairman Brendan Carr announced enforcement proceedings against ABC’s The View, alleging violations of the equal-time rule.
The controversy centers on whether talk shows like The View and late-night programs qualify as “bona fide news.”
The situation escalated after Stephen Colbert claimed CBS prevented him from airing a candidate interview on Monday.

FCC chairman Brendan Carr is coming after The View for what he claims were violations of the “equal-time” rule regarding political candidates running for office.

“If you are bona fide news, you don’t have to give candidates equal air time,” Carr said on Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle on Wednesday (February 18). “But Disney and The View have not established that that program is, in fact, bona fide news. We’ve started enforcement proceedings, taking a look at that. And, again, we’re going to hold broadcasters accountable.” (Watch it below.)

The equal-time rule states that shows must provide equivalent access to competing political candidates. The exception to this is news programs, and, for a long time, talk shows that feature interviews with politicians were also exempt from the rule.

In recent weeks, Carr has sought to remove late-night talk shows and other broadcast network talk shows from the exemptions. This caused an uproar earlier this week when Stephen Colbert said he was banned from interviewing Texas Senate candidate James Talarico on The Late Show.

“We’ve started enforcement proceedings.” Trump lapdog FCC Chairman Brendan Carr confirms he’s now investigating “The View”. He’s trying to stop the cohosts from being critical of Dear Leader. It’s not going to work, it’s only going to boost their ratings. pic.twitter.com/pFoRbIzvbL

— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) February 19, 2026

“Let’s call this what it is: Donald Trump‘s administration wants to silence anyone who says anything bad about Trump on TV because all Trump does is watch TV,” Colbert claimed on Tuesday’s (February 17) Late Show. The interview was instead uploaded to the show’s YouTube page, where it currently has over 7 million views.

CBS later denied Colbert’s claims. “The show was provided legal guidance that the broadcast could trigger the FCC equal-time rule for two other candidates, including Rep. Jasmine Crockett, and presented options for how the equal time for other candidates could be fulfilled,” the network said in a statement. “The Late Show decided to present the interview through its YouTube channel with on-air promotion on the broadcast rather than potentially providing the equal-time options.”

Jimmy Kimmel Criticizes FCC’s Equal-Time Demands for Talk Shows

ABC’s The View previously interviewed Talarico on the February 2 episode, which seems to be the focus of the FCC’s “enforcement proceedings.”

Carr touched on the Colbert drama in his interview with Ingraham, saying, “President Trump has been so far ahead of the curve on so many issues, on the economy, on border security, and perhaps nowhere else when he called out the legacy media for being fake news. And yesterday, the American people got to see that on full display. It’s why people have more trust and faith in gas station sushi today than they do in the legacy news media. This was Democrat-on-Democrat violence.”

Noting that Talarico’s campaign received over $2 million in donations since the Colbert situation, Carr claimed, without evidence, that the entire thing was manufactured to benefit the Texas Democrat.

“This was all about a political candidate trying to get attention and clicks,” Carr said. “And the news media ran with it like lemmings. They just ate it up.”