Looking to the FCC for help on ‘fake news’

The ongoing drive to prevent the Bush administration from creating publicly-funded fake news segments is continuing unabated, but the president’s critics are a little short on allies. The administration won’t budge, Republicans in Congress won’t hold hearings, and the Justice Department hasn’t exactly leaped into action to investigate.

With this in mind, attention now shifts to the FCC.

A Senate Democrat influential on telecommunications issues has asked federal regulators to investigate whether any laws were broken by broadcasters who aired video news releases produced by the government.

Stations may have violated the law if they used the video releases without disclosing that the government was the source of the information, Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, wrote in a letter to the Federal Communications Commission.

The FCC should “take any remedial measures necessary to prevent station owners from misleading their viewers”, said Inouye, adding that any lack of disclosure also represents “a serious breach of journalistic ethics.”

Inouye, ranking Democrat on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, said the FCC should also scrutinize whether stations violated prohibitions against accepting “money, service or other valuable consideration for the airing of content.”

As options for Dems go, this isn’t a bad idea. The Stop Fake News.org gang makes a pretty convincing case that the law prohibits broadcasters from airing segments paid for by the government without disclosure, which is exactly what’s been happening.

Notice, however, that the FCC route is going after the administration’s practice in a very indirect way. Indeed, Inouye’s initiative targets stations that air Bush’s fake news, instead of the administration itself. But that isn’t a bad thing. The administration doesn’t care about legal limits in this area, but broadcasters may be inclined to steer clear of these segments if they face pressure, particularly from the FCC.

Ideally, the burden would be on the administration to stop this propaganda, but with limited recourse options, this is the next best thing and may have the intended benefit anyway. After all, the administration won’t produce fake news if it believes no one will see it.