Broadcast ownership rules spark debate over local journalism, competition at Senate hearing

A Senate Commerce Committee hearing on Feb. 10, 2026, exposed deep divisions over whether decades-old media ownership restrictions should be eliminated or preserved, with broadcast executives, policy advocates and legal experts offering sharply contrasting views on the fate of local news and market competition.

The hearing centered on the Federal Communications Commission’s national television ownership cap, which limits a single broadcaster from reaching more than 39% of U.S. television households. The cap has taken on new urgency as Nexstar Media Group pursues a merger with Tegna that would create a combined company with 265 stations reaching approximately 80% of American households.

“Are longstanding broadcast media ownership rules still relevant in the digital age?” asked Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, framing the central question before the committee. “And if so, to what extent?”

The 39% cap was set by Congress, but disagreement persists over whether the FCC retains authority to modify or eliminate it.

Curtis LeGeyt, president and chief executive officer of the National Association of Broadcasters, argued the restriction prevents local stations from achieving necessary scale.

“In a digital media marketplace dominated by Google, YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Meta and TikTok, ownership restrictions that apply only to broadcasters are no longer rational or sustainable,” LeGeyt said. “They prevent broadcasters from achieving the scale necessary to compete for audience, programming, advertising revenues and investment capital.”

LeGeyt noted that more than half of television stations now report their local news operations are not profitable as standalone businesses. According to Nielsen data cited in his testimony, streaming viewership reached nearly half of all television viewership in December, while broadcast accounted for just 20%.

Streaming gains in share of TV viewing in December, Nielsen reports

Chris Ruddy, chief executive officer of Newsmax Media, countered that existing consolidation has already harmed competition and consumers. He pointed to Nexstar’s current position, which he said gives the company 70% national reach through the use of a UHF discount that treats UHF stations as reaching only half their actual audience.

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“Nexstar’s EBITDA grew from $300 million in 2015 to close to $2 billion in 2024,” Ruddy said. “Almost a 500% increase.”

Ruddy argued that large station groups leverage their broadcast holdings to extract higher fees from cable operators for their cable channels. He cited NewsNation, owned by Nexstar, as receiving higher fees than Newsmax despite having one-fifth the viewership.

“Last year, Newsmax delivered five times the rating of NewsNation, yet operators were forced not only to carry NewsNation, but to pay license fees higher than that paid to Newsmax,” Ruddy said.

Retransmission consent fees, which broadcasters charge pay-TV providers to carry their signals, have increased more than 2,000% since 2010, according to data Ruddy presented. Those fees now account for more than 50% of broadcast revenues.

Legal authority disputed over FCC’s power to modify cap

Disagreement over whether the FCC can legally change the ownership cap without congressional action was a key focus of the hearing. Thomas Johnson, a partner at Wiley Rein LLP who served as FCC general counsel during the first Trump administration, argued the commission retains discretion.

“On two occasions in 1996 and 2004, Congress chose the language ‘modify its rules’ to instruct the commission to make a one-time change to its long-standing national ownership cap rule,” Johnson said. He noted the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals determined this language preserved FCC discretion to make further changes.

However, the 2004 law set the cap at 39%, gave companies two years to comply, barred the FCC from using forbearance authority to waive it, and excluded the cap from the agency’s established regulatory review process.

When Cruz pressed LeGeyt on whether the FCC could have raised the cap to 100% immediately after the 2004 law passed, LeGeyt acknowledged: “Nothing in the act would prohibit the FCC from doing so,” though he noted practical constraints from the appropriations process.

Local journalism crisis complicates consolidation debate

Steven Waldman, founder and president of Rebuild Local News, provided context on the broader crisis facing local journalism. He testified that approximately 3,500 newspapers have closed in the past 20 years, with two closing every week on average.

“Perhaps most importantly, in the last 20 years, there’s been a 75% drop in the number of local journalists,” Waldman said. “That’s in print, TV, digital.”

Studies show areas with less local news experience more corruption, government waste and less civic involvement, according to Waldman’s testimony. He cautioned that while consolidation might enable some investments in local news, evidence suggests it often reduces newsroom staffing.

“Both things could happen,” Waldman said when asked about consolidation’s impact. “And so when we’re talking about what the FCC’s authority is there, it’s not just about the cap, it’s also about the very definition of localism.”

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Ranking Member Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, expressed concern that the proposed Nexstar-Tegna merger would concentrate ownership further.

“For nearly half of their audience, 100 million people, Nexstar would own two or more stations in a media market,” Cantwell said. “Now that concerns me. To me, that is not more local voices. That is fewer.”

Data shows contrasting trends in local news production

LeGeyt presented data showing local news telecasts increased by more than 40% from 2011 to 2023, with total hours of local news growing nearly 50%. He attributed these gains to efficiencies from scale.

“Scale allows broadcasters to invest more heavily in journalism, not less,” LeGeyt said, noting that broadcast newsrooms employ more than 27,000 people, exceeding print and digital news counterparts.

Ruddy disputed this characterization, pointing to Nexstar’s consolidation of newsrooms in the 15 markets where it operates duopolies following its Tribune acquisition. He said the company reduced its workforce from 16,000 to 12,000 employees within one year of that merger.

“In their projections on the merger, they’re saying because of the consolidation, they’re going to have $300 million in savings,” Ruddy said. “And almost half of it, $135 million, comes from local programming consolidation.”

FCC process and presidential involvement questioned

Multiple senators expressed concern about the transparency of the FCC’s review process. Cruz noted that in 2023, he criticized then-Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel for delegating a major transaction to the Media Bureau rather than requiring a full commission vote.

Donald Trump posted on Truth Social regarding the Nexstar-Tegna merger, writing: “Get that deal done.” FCC Chairman Brendan Carr responded on X: “President Trump is exactly right. The national networks like Comcast and Disney have amassed too much power.”

Senator Ben Ray Luján, D-New Mexico, questioned whether Carr had prejudged the matter. “Are you concerned about Chair Carr’s willingness to rubber stamp this merger?” Luján asked Ruddy.

“I think Chairman Carr has not given the president good advice,” Ruddy responded. “On the face of it, he says that he wants to increase competition by allowing massive consolidation.”

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All four witnesses supported or did not oppose having any decision on the Nexstar-Tegna merger made at the commission level rather than by bureau staff, though LeGeyt and Johnson said the FCC has discretion over the level at which decisions are made.

Big tech’s role in local news economics debated

Witnesses across the political spectrum agreed that technology companies have fundamentally altered the economics of local journalism. LeGeyt said more than 70% of the local advertising marketplace has shifted from traditional media to big tech over the past two decades.

Waldman warned that artificial intelligence poses an additional threat to local news business models. “AI will further deplete the revenue of local news outlets,” he said. “AI companies will suck in the local news content to train and ground the AI assistants, which then provide full answers instead of linking prominently off to the publisher websites.”

He proposed that AI companies should compensate local news organizations for content use, that data centers should contribute to local journalism endowments, and that tech platforms should pay mitigation fees to support community news.

Retransmission consent fees have decreased industry-wide over the past three years, according to LeGeyt, contradicting claims of growing market power.

“We’re competing with Google, Apple, Netflix, Amazon for audiences,” he said. “Our audiences have fragmented.”