Disney sues FCC and its chair, escalating fight against Trump’s chief censor

Disney sues FCC and its chair, escalating fight against Trump’s chief censor 迪士尼起诉美国联邦通信委员会（FCC）及其主席，升级了针对特朗普首席审查官的对抗。

Disney today sued the Federal Communications Commission and FCC Chairman Brendan Carr in a lawsuit that aims to stop what it called a “campaign of censorship” waged by the Trump administration against ABC. Disney, ABC, and the eight broadcast stations they own filed a complaint in US District Court for the District of Columbia. They also submitted a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction that would halt the FCC proceeding in which Carr is threatening to deny renewals of broadcast licenses held by ABC stations. 迪士尼今日起诉美国联邦通信委员会（FCC）及其主席布伦丹·卡尔（Brendan Carr），旨在阻止其所称的特朗普政府针对美国广播公司（ABC）发起的“审查运动”。迪士尼、ABC及其旗下的八家广播电台已向美国哥伦比亚特区联邦地区法院提起诉讼。他们还提交了一项临时限制令和初步禁令动议，要求停止FCC的相关程序，在该程序中，卡尔威胁要拒绝续签ABC电台持有的广播执照。

The lawsuit accused the FCC of violating the First Amendment by retaliating against the company’s protected expression. “Again and again, the Administration has attacked ABC’s speech—the stories its journalists report and the viewpoints its network programs air,” the lawsuit said. “Over time, those attacks have escalated into express demands that ABC be stripped of its broadcast licenses because of its speech.” 诉讼指控FCC通过报复该公司的受保护言论，违反了美国宪法第一修正案。诉讼称：“政府一次又一次地攻击ABC的言论——包括其记者的报道内容以及其电视节目播出的观点。随着时间的推移，这些攻击已升级为明确的要求，即因ABC的言论而剥夺其广播执照。”

The lawsuit asked the court to halt any further actions in the early license review that Carr ordered for all eight ABC stations. In particular, it asked the court to prevent the FCC from issuing a Hearing Designation Order that would all but guarantee a negative outcome for the ABC stations. 诉讼请求法院停止卡尔下令对所有八家ABC电台进行的提前执照审查中的任何进一步行动。特别是，它要求法院阻止FCC发布“听证指定令”（Hearing Designation Order），因为该命令几乎可以确保ABC电台面临负面结果。

FCC left Disney “no choice”

FCC让迪士尼“别无选择”

While ABC station licenses are scheduled for renewals between 2028 and 2031, Carr took the highly unusual step of ordering the stations to file renewal applications several years early. Revoking a license in the middle of a term has been described as somewhere between difficult and effectively impossible. Despite the legal difficulty of revoking a license, Disney’s lawsuit said the FCC could use a hearing “to deny license renewal or immediately revoke the Stations’ licenses, forcing Plaintiffs off the air entirely, as the President has repeatedly demanded.” 尽管ABC电台的执照原定于2028年至2031年间续签，但卡尔采取了极不寻常的举措，要求这些电台提前数年提交续签申请。在执照有效期内吊销执照被认为极其困难，甚至实际上是不可能的。尽管吊销执照在法律上存在难度，但迪士尼的诉讼指出，FCC可能会利用听证会“拒绝续签执照或立即吊销电台执照，迫使原告彻底停播，正如总统多次要求的那样。”

Even if the FCC doesn’t go that far, it can “mir[e] ABC in years of costly litigation, with the threat of adverse action ever present and with every editorial judgment shadowed by the prospect of provoking the Administration into further retaliation,” the lawsuit said. “Facing this existential threat, Plaintiffs have no choice but to seek redress from the judicial branch for the Administration’s blatant retaliation for their First Amendment speech,” the lawsuit said. “Plaintiffs come to this Court reluctantly with no alternative means to eliminate these ongoing and immediate threats other than total capitulation to the Administration’s demands.” 诉讼称，即使FCC没有采取那么极端的手段，它也可以“让ABC陷入长达数年的昂贵诉讼中，始终面临不利行动的威胁，且每一次编辑判断都笼罩在可能激怒政府并招致进一步报复的阴影之下”。诉讼表示：“面对这种生存威胁，原告别无选择，只能就政府对其第一修正案言论的公然报复向司法部门寻求救济。原告是无奈之下才来到法院的，除了完全屈服于政府的要求外，别无他法来消除这些持续且迫在眉睫的威胁。”

Carr ordered the review of ABC’s broadcast licenses in April, one day after Trump and the first lady called on ABC to fire Jimmy Kimmel over a joke in which he said Melania Trump looked like an “expectant widow.” The Carr FCC claims the license review is necessary because ABC’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) practices may violate anti-discrimination rules. 卡尔于4月下令审查ABC的广播执照，就在此举的前一天，特朗普和第一夫人曾要求ABC解雇吉米·坎摩尔（Jimmy Kimmel），原因是他开了一个玩笑，称梅拉尼娅·特朗普看起来像个“准寡妇”。卡尔领导下的FCC声称，进行执照审查是必要的，因为ABC的多元化、公平和包容性（DEI）实践可能违反了反歧视规则。

The Carr-led FCC today accused Disney of spreading disinformation. “All broadcasters have a legal obligation to operate in the public interest—even Disney,” an FCC spokesperson said in a statement provided to Ars. “The FCC has been examining claims that Disney engaged in illegal DEI discrimination for over a year. Disney is obviously very concerned about the FCC’s proceeding, as evidenced by their ongoing campaign of disinformation as well as their decision to ask a court to stop the FCC from further pursuing matters. The FCC will continue to follow the facts and law wherever they lead.” 卡尔领导的FCC今日指责迪士尼散布虚假信息。FCC发言人在提供给Ars的一份声明中表示：“所有广播公司都有法律义务在公共利益下运营——即使是迪士尼也不例外。FCC对迪士尼涉嫌非法DEI歧视的指控已经调查了一年多。迪士尼显然对FCC的程序感到非常担忧，这从他们持续的虚假信息宣传以及他们决定请求法院阻止FCC进一步追究此事中可见一斑。FCC将继续遵循事实和法律，无论它们指向何处。”

FCC Democrat roots for Disney

FCC民主党委员支持迪士尼

In addition to Carr, Disney’s lawsuit names the other FCC commissioners as defendants. That includes Democrat Anna Gomez, though Gomez has consistently fought Carr’s attacks on ABC and spoke out in support of Disney’s lawsuit. Disney even cited some of Gomez’s comments to support its argument about the Trump administration. 除了卡尔，迪士尼的诉讼还将其他FCC委员列为被告。这其中包括民主党人安娜·戈麦斯（Anna Gomez），尽管戈麦斯一直反对卡尔对ABC的攻击，并公开支持迪士尼的诉讼。迪士尼甚至引用了戈麦斯的一些评论来支持其关于特朗普政府的论点。

“For months, the FCC has waged a campaign of censorship and control against Disney’s ABC stations, using the threat of broadcast license revocations to punish a company for speech this administration doesn’t like,” Gomez said in a statement today. “I have long called on companies to push back against this kind of government intimidation, and I’m glad Disney has shown courage and stepped up. This should be a welcome sign for every broadcaster who has felt the weight of this overreaching government pressure in silence.” 戈麦斯在今日的一份声明中表示：“几个月来，FCC一直对迪士尼旗下的ABC电台进行审查和控制，利用吊销广播执照的威胁来惩罚一家发表了本届政府不喜欢的言论的公司。我长期以来一直呼吁各公司抵制这种政府恐吓，我很高兴迪士尼展现了勇气并站了出来。对于每一位在沉默中感受到这种政府越权压力之重的广播公司来说，这应该是一个受欢迎的信号。”

The Disney lawsuit gives a history of the Trump administration’s attacks on ABC. It notes that after the 2024 presidential election debate hosted by ABC, Trump accused ABC moderators of bias and repeatedly called for ABC to lose broadcast licenses. After winning the election, Trump chose Carr to take the FCC chairmanship and Carr “has likewise agreed with the President that the FCC should pursue grave remedies such as revocation when it disapproves of networks’ speech,” the lawsuit said. 迪士尼的诉讼梳理了特朗普政府攻击ABC的历史。诉讼指出，在ABC主办的2024年总统大选辩论后，特朗普指责ABC的主持人存在偏见，并多次呼吁剥夺ABC的广播执照。诉讼称，在赢得大选后，特朗普选择了卡尔担任FCC主席，而卡尔“同样同意总统的观点，即当FCC不赞同电视网的言论时，应采取吊销执照等严厉措施”。

The lawsuit describes the November 2025 incident in which ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Mary Bruce asked Trump why he was waiting for Congress to release the Epstein files instead of doing it himself immediately. Trump responded, “You’re a terrible person, and a terrible reporter… I think the license should be taken away from ABC because your news is so fake, and it’s so wrong, and we have a great commissioner, a chairman, who should look at that. Because I think when you come in and when you’re 97 percent negative to Trump, and then Trump wins the election by a landslide, that means obviously your news is not credible, and you’re not credible as a reporter.” 诉讼描述了2025年11月发生的一起事件：ABC新闻白宫首席记者玛丽·布鲁斯（Mary Bruce）询问特朗普，为什么他要等待国会发布爱泼斯坦文件，而不是自己立即发布。特朗普回应道：“你是个糟糕的人，也是个糟糕的记者……我认为应该吊销ABC的执照，因为你们的新闻太假了，太错误了，我们有一位伟大的委员、主席，他应该看看这个问题。因为我认为，当你们进来时，对特朗普有97%的负面报道，而特朗普却以压倒性优势赢得了选举，这显然意味着你们的新闻不可信，作为记者，你们也不可信。”

White House called ABC “a Democrat spin operation”

白宫称ABC是“民主党的宣传机器”

The White House issued a press release the next day stating that “ABC ‘News’ is not journalism—it’s a Democrat spin operation masquerading as a broadcast network.” Carr had already threatened ABC station licenses in September 2025, saying that stations could be guilty of “news distortion” and f 白宫在次日发布新闻稿称：“ABC‘新闻’不是新闻业——它是一个伪装成广播电视网的民主党宣传机器。”卡尔早在2025年9月就曾威胁过ABC电台的执照，称这些电台可能犯有“新闻歪曲”罪，并……