Disney and ABC sue US regulator over early license review they call a free-speech attack
And ABC have taken the fight over broadcast rights to federal court, suing the US Federal Communications Commission to block an unusual early review
Disney and ABC have taken the fight over broadcast rights to federal court, suing the US Federal Communications Commission to block an unusual early review of their local TV station licenses. The companies say the move crosses a constitutional line and amounts to retaliation over what ABC puts on air.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, is one of the most forceful legal challenges a media company has mounted against the second Trump administration. It asks a federal judge to stop the FCC from pushing ahead with renewal proceedings that were not due until 2028 at the earliest.
Licenses pulled forward years early
In late April, the FCC ordered Disney’s eight owned-and-operated television stations to file their broadcast license renewals ahead of schedule. The stations are in major US markets, including Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco. All eight are part of the new suit.
The commission said little publicly about the move at the time, but the action landed as the agency was already probing ABC’s daytime show The View and reviewing Disney’s diversity, equity and inclusion practices. The timing sharpened the company’s complaint that the process was not routine regulation, but pressure.
ABC and Disney argue the government has gone after the network’s speech for months. Their filing points to attacks from the White House and President Donald Trump himself after ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel made a joke about first lady Melania Trump. The lawsuit also cites Trump social media posts complaining about late-night TV hosts.
'Retaliatory campaign,' says the network
According to the complaint, the FCC under Chairman Brendan Carr — an ally of Trump — launched unprecedented investigations and forced the early filings because it disapproved of ABC’s broadcasting. The network says the campaign has escalated into demands that it be stripped of its licenses over speech.
“Again and again, the Administration has attacked ABC’s speech,” the filing says, referring to the reporting and viewpoints aired by the company’s journalists and network programs. The suit says the pressure now poses an “existential threat” to ABC’s operations.
The challenge lands in a broader clash between major media companies and the Trump administration, with broadcast licenses at the center. For ABC, the stakes are unusually high: losing or weakening those licenses would threaten the stations that carry its programming into millions of homes.
The court is now being asked to halt the FCC’s early renewal process. What happens next could shape how far regulators can go when content, politics and licensing collide.
