the HOT List

As a cable TV industry pioneer and owner of the Atlanta Braves MLB team, Ted Turner was audacious, leaving an imprint across multiple decades. In recent years, health challenges literally crippled him. Now, Turner Enterprises has confirmed his passing at the age of 87 after a long battle with Lewy Body Dementia.

Nexstar Media Group finds itself not only appealing a California Eastern District Court's preliminary injunction preventing it from integrating TEGNA's assets, but also defending its deal in the D.C. Circuit. And, it may have an ally in the Commission itself. How so? The FCC says the court has no jurisdiction, because a final agency action hasn't yet happened.

As Paramount owns CBS, which holds broadcast licenses regulated by the FCC, any financial links to sovereign wealth funds from Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi should be subject to strict scrutiny from the Carr Commission, Anna M. Gómez said.

On April 1, a retransmission consent agreement could not be signed in a timely manner, resulting in a "blackout," by law, of all Scripps-owned stations on one of the nation's largest cable TV providers. A little more than a month later, a new deal has been reached with Comcast-owned Xfinity.

On March 20, iHeartMedia shares finished at $2.49 per share, erasing all gains seen since mid-September 2025. Then came an uptick in value, punctuated by rumors of a potential SiriusXM merger. Since then, "IHRT" shares are on fire, and are at their highest valuation in more than three years.

The nation's largest owner of broadcast TV stations, entangled with DirecTV in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit over its merger with TEGNA, has petitioned the Supreme Court to review a Second Circuit ruling that reversed an antitrust win — one that is wholly tied to retransmission consent negotiations.

Rebuilding a broadcast operation is never a small undertaking, especially when moving from a Windows PC environment to Macs. For Lilly Broadcasting, it meant rethinking everything—from infrastructure and workflows to the tools their teams rely on every day.

Alongside Suzyn Waldman, John Sterling's time behind the mic calling New York Yankees baseball games for radio listeners is among the most legendary of pro sports. Now, fans and many from across the broadcast media world are paying tribute to Sterling, who has died at the age of 87.

A particularly bitter battle over carriage fees for Gray Media's broadcast television channels on one of the nation's two direct broadcast satellite TV service providers ended late Friday, with its channels being restored just in time for the Kentucky Derby on May 2.

Ohio's Attorney General late Thursday announced that it had reached a deal with Nexstar Media Group to keep newsrooms at TEGNA stations in two Buckeye State markets intact for the next several years. Then came word that five state AGs joined California's Rob Bonta in its Sacramento-filed federal lawsuit against Nexstar.

Two heritage radio stations serving Blacks across North Texas for decades are being sold to Urban One. This results in the company led by Alfred Liggins III agreeing to sell its FM at 94.5 MHz to a regional broadcast ministry that plans to switch that station to Spanish-language Christian programming.

Brendan Carr made it clear that the FCC's early license renewal order handed to The Walt Disney Co. regarding its eight ABC Owned Stations properties is tied to potential DEI-linked discrimination and dates to a Commission look that began in 2025. Sen. Ted Cruz feels otherwise, broadening a gulf between Congress and the Commission.

An April 17 preliminary injunction from Sacramento-based Chief U.S. District Judge Troy Nunley prevents Nexstar Media Group from fully integrating the assets its acquired in its rule-busting merger with TEGNA. How that impacted a case against the FCC in the D.C. federal court of appeals became known Wednesday.

The newly highly-exposed successor to Barbara Kreisman has punted objections from two MVPD advocacy groups, paving the way for The E.W. Scripps Co. and Gray Media to complete an asset swap first announced in July 2026.

The Federal Communications Commission has commenced a review of the Commission's assessment and collection of regulatory fees for Fiscal Year 2026. Do you have any thoughts on the proposed rates? A comment period has been established for your input.