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GOP heads to Supreme Court after losing case over TV election ad prices
GOP campaign committees want quick ruling before election ads ramp up next week.
Republican campaign committees want the Supreme Court to mandate lower prices for election commercials on broadcast TV stations. If the court agrees, broadcasters would be forced to offer their lowest ad prices to political parties and joint fundraising committees.
For a more thorough description of the legal issues in the dispute, see this article that Ars published yesterday. In short, US law requires broadcasters to offer individual candidates the “lowest unit charge,” or LUC, during the 60 days before an election. The law helps level the playing field somewhat by letting candidates make their cases to voters who watch broadcast TV without needing to raise exorbitant sums of money.
The Trump administration, acting through the Federal Communications Commission, ordered broadcast TV stations to also give these discounts to political parties and joint fundraising committees, which face fewer limits on how much money they can raise and spend. Four Democratic candidates appealed, and a judges’ panel at the US Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit ruled that the FCC order cannot be enforced because it contradicts the plain language of US law.
The National Republican Congressional Committee and National Republican Senatorial Committee, which intervened in the case to support the FCC’s position, told the 4th Circuit court yesterday that they intend to appeal to the Supreme Court.
The committees submitted an emergency motion for a stay and asked the 4th Circuit to rule on that motion immediately so they can file a petition to the Supreme Court. “Intervenors respectfully request that the Court rule on this stay motion as soon as possible—whether by expediting or waiving response briefs—to permit Intervenors to seek emergency relief at the Supreme Court,” Republican committees told the court.
The court responded quickly, issuing an order today to deny the Republican committee’s motion and to immediately issue a mandate that can be appealed to the Supreme Court. Republicans will now seek swift action from the Supreme Court in an attempt to overturn the 4th Circuit ruling before the 60-day discount period starts on September 4.
“Candidates and committees are currently drafting, negotiating, and signing contracts with broadcasters for the coming weeks,” the motion said. “In fact, candidates and committees are currently creating the advertisements for the contracts that they’ve already signed with broadcasters. The parties need certainty on those contracts to move forward and conduct effective campaigns.”
In another recent case filed by the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Supreme Court ruled that federal limits on how much a political party can spend in coordination with candidates violates the First Amendment. The elimination of those limits could fuel a bigger onslaught of election ads if broadcasters are forced to offer their lowest ad rates to parties and committees.
Anna Gomez, the only Democrat on the FCC, said the agency “is unleashing a flood of coordinated campaign money into broadcast advertising, just as the Supreme Court has cleared the way for unlimited coordinated spending between parties and candidates.” Gomez also said that forcing broadcast stations to offer deep discounts on their most valuable ad inventory will worsen the stations’ financial problems, contradicting the Trump FCC’s stated goal of helping broadcasters compete against Big Tech and streaming.