FCC chairman Ajit Pat said Monday he has “serious concerns” about the $3.9 billion merger, which would have created the country’s largest television station monopoly.
“Based on a thorough review of the record, I have serious concerns about the Sinclair/Tribune transaction,” Pai said in a statement posted on Twitter. “The evidence we’ve received suggests that certain station divestitures that have been proposed to the FCC would allow Sinclair to control those stations in practice, even if not in name, in violation of the law.
Of course this has been obvious since the very beginning, so it makes you wonder what has brought this on. The pressure from the public must be intense.
I hope that's what is happening.
I suspect this is just another CYA round, in which Sinclair will have to forgo their plans for those specific television stations...at least at first...until the furor dies down.
