Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) took to his podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz, to attack Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr, accusing him of “dangerous as hell” mafia-like tactics that pushed for the removal of Jimmy Kimmel’s show.
Carr last Wednesday threatened action against late night television host Kimmel, as well as Disney and ABC, after Kimmel said that Charlie Kirk’s assassin was part of the “MAGA gang.”
The Chairman said, “The FCC could make a strong argument that this is sort of an intentional effort to mislead the American people about a very core fundamental fact, a very important matter.”
Cruz said on his podcast, “And I’ve got to say, that’s right out of Goodfellas. That’s right out of a mafioso coming into a bar going, ‘Nice bar you have here, it’d be a shame if something happened to it.’”
He then claimed that this would create a new precedent for the left to one day censor conservatives.
“They will silence us. They will use this power, and they will use it ruthlessly. And that is dangerous,” he continued.
President Donald Trump disagreed with Cruz’s characterization of the FCC chairman.
“I think Brendan Carr is a great American patriot. So I disagree with Ted Cruz on that,” the president told reporters last Friday.
Senate Democrats on the Commerce Committee urged Cruz, the committee’s chairman, to hold a hearing with Carr on the matter.
“You have long prioritized conducting oversight to ensure our government is not being used to weaponize the censorship of speech. At a time when free speech is under threat, this hearing could not be more important for the American people,” the Democrats wrote to Cruz.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) spoke out in favor of Carr, saying, “I think the FCC was raising questions about what these broadcast entities, you know, are doing with their licenses. They’re well within their bounds to do that,” Roy said Thursday. “And the First Amendment needs to be absolutely guarded and protected, but again, we do a lot of thing with FCC licenses. We don’t let you say anything on broadcast. You know, we have, you know, some constraints there, and that’s appropriate.”
Breitbart News’s John Nolte noted that it has been one full week since Kimmel lied about Kirk’s accused assassin about being a Trump supporter and it has yet to be retracted.
A YouGov poll found that of 2,355 American adults surveyed, 40 percent are unsure what the assassin’s political affiliation is, 21 percent said he is a Democrat, 24 percent a Republican, and 15 percent say neither.
Carr has suggested he might take further regulatory action.
“We’re not done yet,” he said last Thursday.
