How the FCC Handed Nexstar the Keys to Local News — and a Judge Said Not So Fast
There is a rule. It has existed for decades. It says that no single company can own television stations that collectively reach more than 39% of American households. The rule exists because the people who wrote it understood something fundamental: when one entity controls what most of the country watches on local television, that entity controls an enormous amount of what most of the country believes about its community, its government, and its world.
On March 19, 2026, the FCC approved Nexstar’s $6.2 billion acquisition of Tegna. The combined company would own 259 stations reaching 80% of U.S. television households. To make this legal, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr’s Media Bureau waived the 39% ownership cap. The waiver did not go to a vote of the full commission. RealClearPolling
One bureaucrat. One waiver. No vote. Eighty percent of the country.
Nexstar announced the transaction was complete fifteen minutes after the FCC approval came through, at 7:05 p.m. EDT. Fifteen minutes. They had the paperwork ready. They knew it was coming. They moved faster than most people can read a press release. RealClearPolling
Trump had personally endorsed the deal in February — a highly unusual step for a sitting president to take in a pending regulatory matter — and Carr followed hours later with his own endorsement. Trump had posted on Truth Social that the merger would help counter “radical left fake news networks.” This is the part where the mask comes off. The president of the United States, whose party spent four decades screaming about media consolidation and coastal elite control of the press, personally championed a deal that would put 259 local news stations under the control of a single company — a company with known conservative leanings that had already cancelled Jimmy Kimmel’s show on its ABC affiliates, conducted mass layoffs at WGN Chicago, WPIX New York, and KTLA Los Angeles, and spent $3.2 million lobbying the federal government in 2025 alone. RealClearPolling
The argument Nexstar made to investors was telling: the company promised $300 million annually in “synergies” from integrating Tegna’s operations. In the past, such savings have reliably meant one thing — layoffs and merged newsrooms. After Nexstar acquired Tribune Media, they merged the Indianapolis stations’ newsrooms entirely. That is the model. Buy the stations. Hollow out the newsroom. Collect the retransmission fees. Call it local journalism. Race to the WH
Eight Democratic state attorneys general and DirecTV sued immediately. And on April 18th, U.S. District Judge Troy Nunley issued a preliminary injunction blocking the merger from taking effect. The judge found the transaction was “presumed likely to violate antitrust laws,” noting the combined firm’s market share exceeded 30% in 31 local markets and topped 50% in 16 of them. He also raised a pointed legal question that goes to the heart of the whole scheme: opponents of the deal argue that Congress passed a law setting the 39% threshold, meaning only Congress — not an FCC bureau chief — can waive it. Whatsonmyballot270toWin.com
That argument matters enormously. Because what Carr did was not simply approve a merger. He asserted the authority to erase a congressionally mandated ownership cap by fiat, without a commission vote, without congressional input, and without meaningful public comment — greenlighting the deal the same evening Nexstar had their press release ready.
The judge criticized the DOJ’s antitrust division for failing to raise the obvious antitrust issues, noting that during Nexstar’s 2019 Tribune Media acquisition, the DOJ had weighed in forcefully and required significant divestitures. This time, they said almost nothing. Race to the WH
The merger is frozen for now. The injunction holds while an antitrust trial proceeds. Nexstar is appealing to the Ninth Circuit. The outcome is genuinely uncertain.
But here is what is not uncertain: a presidential administration just tried to hand 80% of local American television to a single company, waived the law that prevented it, skipped the vote that would have created a public record, and moved so fast that the deal closed before most people knew it was happening. The only thing standing between that outcome and the American public is a federal judge in Sacramento and a coalition of state attorneys general who noticed what was happening and decided to fight it.
That’s not a functioning regulatory system. That’s a very close call.