Rudy Giuliani and FCC Order Early ABC License Review

rudy giuliani is in critical condition in a Florida hospital, while the Federal Communications Commission ordered an early review of ABC's licenses on Tuesday. The agency said the review is part of its investigation into Disney's diversity, equity and inclusion practices. ABC owns eight TV stations, including WABC-TV in New York and KABC-TV in Los Angeles.

The expedited review drew scrutiny because it came the day after President Trump called for Jimmy Kimmel's firing. Kimmel had made a joke on his late-night ABC talk show that angered Trump and Melania Trump.

Brendan Carr and Disney

FCC chairman Brendan Carr said ABC's mandatory inclusion standards may have led the network to institute racial and identity quotas at every level of production. In a letter to then-Disney CEO Robert Iger last year, Carr said the network's standards may have created those quotas, and he later said the agency was holding broadcasters accountable to their obligations.

At a press conference on Thursday, Carr said, "You can go all the way back to more than a year ago, in March of last year, where I wrote a letter to Disney saying that there was evidence... or allegations indicating that Disney, through this sort of invidious form of DEI discrimination, was creating, as I specified in a letter to them, racially segregated spaces inside the company," and added, "We've been very clear that we're holding broadcasters accountable to their obligations — not just public interest standards, but [equal employment opportunity] obliga"

Disney and ABC licenses

Disney said it has a long record of operating in full compliance with FCC rules. The company said it is confident the record shows its continued qualifications as licensees under the Communications Act and the First Amendment, and said it is prepared to make that case through the appropriate legal channels.

Katie Fallow, deputy litigation director of Columbia University's Knight First Amendment Institute, said, "This is a way to put pressure on Disney and ABC to achieve different programming and to get them to fire Jimmy Kimmel," and described the timing as "highly suspect." Blair Levin, a policy analyst with New Street Research and a former FCC employee, said the "timing of the order is strong evidence that the motive for the early renewal process relates to the president's call to fire Kimmel, not an ABC employment action."

The FCC's probe into Disney began in March 2025 and centers on whether the company's DEI policies violated federal anti-discrimination rules. Carr also said the FCC earlier this week ordered another broadcaster, Bridge News, to file early license renewal applications for its TV stations, a parallel step that puts ABC's license review into a broader agency push.

For ABC, the immediate issue is the early renewal process for stations that reach viewers in New York and Los Angeles. The next step is whether the FCC moves from review to any licensing action after weighing Disney's response and the agency's discrimination claims.