A federal lawsuit says pressure from Trump’s FCC pushed the show’s producers to quietly stop inviting political candidates on air. The same pressure got a few political clips pulled from “Hot Topics” and the cold open, too.
ABC put it in writing: the FCC’s “escalating pressures” led producers to be “more circumspect in booking political candidates on The View,” and to pass on several candidates entirely.
The admission is in a lawsuit ABC filed Tuesday, Aug. 18. The company says it hasn’t changed its editorial standards, but the FCC’s targeting has “impacted the program’s decisions about which guests to invite.” Producers also dropped some political video clips from the “Hot Topics” segment and the cold open. The last politician booked on the show was former U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene on July 7, 2026.
The enforcement proceeding started in February over an episode featuring James Talarico, now the Democratic nominee for Senate in Texas. Trump-appointed FCC Chair Brendan Carr argued the appearance could violate the agency’s equal-time rule, which requires broadcasters to give comparable opportunities to opposing candidates.
ABC calls the whole thing a “retaliatory campaign” tied to its programming and its criticism of the Trump administration. Tension escalated last year after Carr went after Jimmy Kimmel’s comments about the reaction to Charlie Kirk‘s assassination, telling MAGA podcast host Benny Johnson in September 2025, “we can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
In April, the FCC ordered an early review of eight broadcast licenses owned by Disney, including ABC stations in New York and Philadelphia. The lawsuit asks that the review be blocked.
If this resonated, follow Thought Catalog on Facebook and explore more stories on our website.
