FCC Seeks Supreme Court Review of Media Ownership Decision

The Solicitor General of the United States, on behalf of the Federal Communications Commission, has asked the Supreme Court to review a US Third Circuit Court of Appeals decision overturning most of the FCC's media ownership deregulation decision, hammering the circuit for what the FCC suggested was serial obstruction of what it had concluded was in the public interest. The FCC said that it has been trying to grant the ownership deregulation for 17 years, thwarted by a series of decisions by a divided panel of the Third Circuit. It said the most recent decision to vacate "a host of significant rule changes" was based "solely on the ground that the agency had not adequately analyzed the rules’ likely effect on female and minority ownership of broadcast stations." [Yeah, that's "solely", if you're tracking at home.] The FCC argues that for those 17 years the court has blocked it from exercising its mandate by Congress to repeal or modify any ownership rule it determines is no longer in the public interest.