Trump Threatens Licenses of TV Stations That Criticize Him

[LymphocyteLover]

Source: Bloomberg

There's a paywall so I can't read it but this article was linked below this Bluesky post
"Headlines on the Bloomberg Terminal from Air Force One:

*TRUMP: TV LICENSES SHOULD BE TAKEN AWAY IF BAD PUBLICITY FOR ME
*TRUMP: IF TV SHOWS 'HIT TRUMP' SHOULD BE DISCUSSED ON LICENSES
*TRUMP ON TV SHOWS CRITICIZING HIM: THEY'RE NOT ALLOWED TO"

Headlines on the Bloomberg Terminal from Air Force One:

*TRUMP: TV LICENSES SHOULD BE TAKEN AWAY IF BAD PUBLICITY FOR ME
*TRUMP: IF TV SHOWS 'HIT TRUMP' SHOULD BE DISCUSSED ON LICENSES
*TRUMP ON TV SHOWS CRITICIZING HIM: THEY'RE NOT ALLOWED TO

— Thomas Seal (@twseal.bsky.social) 2025-09-18T18:02:00.533Z

Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-09-18/trump-says-kimmel-suspended-over-bad-ratings-not-free-speech

[no_hypocrisy]

1. We're "there".

[Miguelito Loveless]

6. We have been there

since the election. All that was left was paperwork.

[JoseBalow]

8. The illusion of freedom

[LymphocyteLover]

9. it certainly should be blindingly obvious to EVERYONE at this point. Real fucking fascism alive and well

right here in the good ol' USA.

[C_U_L8R]

2. Quite a pickle

lose your license or lose your audience.

they should have stood up to Trump long ago… now they are thoroughly fucked.
I”m voting with my clicker.

[dweller]

3. Archive link

https://archive.ph/jO4Pf



✌🏻

[littlemissmartypants]

13. TY...

I was just about to post it. GMTA

❤️

[Dave Bowman]

4. That's so mature of him. He's acting like a thin-skinned spoiled brat.

[LiberalArkie]

19. Kind of acting like Richard Nixon.

[enough]

5. He's making it so clear that it's going to backfire. He's not even pretending

that it has to do with combating “leftwing violence.”

[Cha]

7. FU ya GD NAZI FUChead... & thanks for

inviting this Fascist Fuck to the royal palace, Charles.

[Endlessmike56]

10. All because

I just couldn’t vote for a black woman President. 🤬

[NoMoreRepugs]

11. Certain MSNBC hosts better stay away from windows above the fourth floor.

[chouchou]

12. Ah..Donald. Old proverb: "Don't push people too far, they might come close enough to stop you".

[ReRe]

14. K&R

Well there you go. Right outta the horse's mouth into perpetuity. He can't take that back.
Place that right there in evidence, court clerk. Thank you!

[mdbl]

15. Don't worry Mr Dump

I have plenty of other sources. You ruined network television so I don't watch that anyway. Have at it you big democracy hating asshole.

[topcelts]

16. It's Easy

Stop watching Networks. Quit buying what they're selling. Money is all that talks.

[DallasNE]

17. That Is The Precise Reason Independent Agencies Were Established

But the Supreme Court has empowered Trump to fire for any reason whatsoever, rather than only for cause. Trump couldn't be doing this without the full support of the Supreme Court. America is in bad shape right now Very bad. And time is running out to fix it.

[CaptainTruth]

18. The govt can only do this for broadcast stations, local affiliates.

It has no effect on cable, streaming etc networks because they don't broadcast on frequencies owned by the US govt.

And... how many people watch broadcast TV (with an antenna & a receiver) today? 1% of all viewers?

[Wiz Imp]

21. They can't legally do it for broadcast TV either

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2025/sep/18/brendan-carr-fcc-jimmy-kimmel

Tom Wheeler, a former FCC chair appointed by President Barack Obama, said Carr is “incredibly bright” and savvy about using the broad latitude given to the chairman, “exploiting the vagaries in the term ‘the public interest’”. Instead of the deregulation Trump promised voters, the administration “delivered this kind of micromanagement”, Wheeler said. “It’s not the appropriate job of the FCC chairman to become the censor-in-chief,” Wheeler said.

The lone Democrat on the FCC, Anna Gomez, criticized Carr for “using the weight of government power to suppress lawful expression”. Gomez called ABC’s decision “a shameful show of cowardly corporate capitulation” that threatened the first amendment, and said the FCC was operating beyond its authority and outside the bounds of the constitution.

“If it were to take the unprecedented step of trying to revoke broadcast licenses, which are held by local stations rather than national networks, it would run headlong into the first amendment and fail in court on both the facts and the law,” Gomez wrote in a statement. “But even the threat to revoke a license is no small matter. It poses an existential risk to a broadcaster, which by definition cannot exist without its license. That makes billion-dollar companies with pending business before the agency all the more vulnerable to pressure to bend to the government’s ideological demands.”

[CaptainTruth]

23. Thanks!

[travelingthrulife]

20. How long will the GOP allow this monster to destroy our economy and government.

This is all on the heads of the GOP. They could end his reign of terror this week if they chose to.

[LymphocyteLover]

22. Exactly! They can't ALL be happy with this, meaning they are scared to speak out, which is fucked up.

[FakeNoose]

24. Dear God, will somebody PLEASE take away his cellphone ... make this STOP!