NBC aired a Donald Trump advertisement for free on Sunday to comply with the FCC’s “equal time” rule following Vice President Kamala Harris’s surprise appearance on Saturday Night Live the night before. The rule mandates that broadcast networks provide equal airtime to all legally qualified political candidates if one is given access.
During her last-minute appearance on the show, Harris joined Maya Rudolph, who has played the vice president in sketches during the election cycle.
Harris appeared for about 90 seconds, prompting NBC to air a Trump ad of similar length twice, following a NASCAR race and Sunday Night Football, where he urged voters to participate in the upcoming election.
A Special Message from President Donald J. Trump pic.twitter.com/B9Lcxaucud
— Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump) November 3, 2024
However, as many observers pointed out, average viewership for Sunday night football hovers around 20 million, compared to the four-year average of 5 million SNL viewers every weekend–meaning Trump was given access to an audience more than four times larger than the one that watched Harris.
FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr criticized Harris’s SNL appearance as a violation of this rule, emphasizing the importance of avoiding partisan bias by broadcasters.
“This is a clear and blatant effort to evade the FCC’s Equal Time rule. The purpose of the rule is to avoid exactly this type of biased and partisan conduct — a licensed broadcaster using the public airwaves to exert its influence for one candidate on the eve of an election. Unless the broadcaster offered Equal Time to other qualifying campaigns,” Carr wrote on X.
This is a clear and blatant effort to evade the FCC's Equal Time rule.
The purpose of the rule is to avoid exactly this type of biased and partisan conduct – a licensed broadcaster using the public airwaves to exert its influence for one candidate on the eve of an election.… https://t.co/LliZF0po9t
— Brendan Carr (@BrendanCarrFCC) November 3, 2024
NBC has filed the necessary notices with the FCC to document Harris’s free appearance on SNL. The network’s compliance efforts reflect the FCC’s guidelines, which do not require identical programming but do mandate comparable opportunities for political candidates.
Connor Walcott is the lead writer for Valuetainment.com. Follow Connor on X and look for him on VT’s “The Unusual Suspects.”
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