{"id":182223,"date":"2026-02-18T00:51:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T00:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/182223\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T00:51:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T00:51:09","slug":"stephen-colbert-calls-out-cbs-for-barring-interview-with-democratic-candidate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/182223\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Colbert calls out CBS for barring interview with Democratic candidate"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Late night comedian Stephen Colbert called out his network, CBS, saying it blocked him from broadcasting an interview with a Democratic U.S. Senate candidate over the Trump administration\u2019s controversial enforcement of its equal-time rules.<\/a> <\/p>\n

During Stephen Colbert\u2019s Monday night monologue on \u201cThe Late Show With Stephen Colbert,\u201d Colbert carried on per usual, introducing the Late Show Band and his guest Jennifer Garner. He then posed the question, \u201cYou know who is not one of my guests tonight?\u201d<\/p>\n

The late-night host was meant to have Texas state Rep. James Talarico on the show. But he said on air that he was \u201ctold in no uncertain terms by our network\u2019s lawyers, who called us directly, that we could not have him on the broadcast.\u201d<\/p>\n

He continued on to explain the FCC\u2019s proposed new guidance for equal-time rules under its chairman, Brendan Carr. The rules require broadcasters who feature political candidates to provide the same time to their rivals, if requested. <\/p>\n

Typically, news content on daytime and late-night talk shows has been excluded from these regulations, as it has been an informal tradition for presidential candidates to make their rounds on various late-night shows. <\/p>\n

But the FCC under Carr \u2014 who has made no secret of his intention to carry out an agenda that is aligned with President Trump\u2019s wishes \u2014 has questioned whether late-night and daytime talk shows deserve an exemption from the equal-time rules for broadcast stations using the public airwaves. <\/p>\n

Many legal and media experts have said a stricter application of the rule would be hard to enforce and could stifle free speech.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s just call this what it is. Donald Trump\u2019s administration wants to silence anyone who says anything bad about Trump on TV, because all Trump does is watch TV,\u201d Colbert said Monday night.<\/p>\n

CBS disputed Colbert\u2019s claims that it prohibited the segment from airing \u201cThe Late Show\u2019s\u201d interview with Talarico.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe show was provided legal guidance that the broadcast could trigger the FCC equal-time rule for two other candidates, including Rep. Jasmine Crockett, and presented options for how the equal time for other candidates could be fulfilled,\u201d wrote a CBS spokesperson. \u201c \u2018The Late Show\u2019 decided to present the interview through its YouTube channel with on-air promotion on the broadcast rather than potentially providing the equal-time options.\u201d<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, ABC\u2019s \u201cThe View\u201d<\/a> featured Talarico as well as his main rival, fellow Democrat Jasmine Crockett. Talarico is currently facing off with Crockett and Ahmad Hassan in the Democratic primary for one of Texas\u2019 two seats in the U.S. Senate. The FCC is also reportedly investigating his appearance on \u201cThe View.\u201d<\/p>\n

Experts consider the equal-time rule to be antiquated, designed for a time when consumers were limited to a handful of TV channels and a dozen radio stations if they lived in a big city. <\/p>\n

The emergence of cable, podcasts and streaming audio and video platforms \u2014 none of which are subject to FCC restrictions in terms of content \u2014 have greatly diminished traditional broadcast media\u2019s dominance in the marketplace. <\/p>\n

Carr has previously suggested that if TV hosts want to include political candidates in their programming, they can do it \u2014 just not on broadcast TV.<\/p>\n

Colbert said he was taking Carr\u2019s \u201cadvice\u201d and revealed that his entire interview with Talarico was instead uploaded on YouTube. During the interview, Talarico calls out the Republican Party for initially running against \u201ccancel culture.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNow they are trying to control what we watch, what we say, what we read. And this is the most dangerous kind of cancel culture, the kind that comes from the top,\u201d Talarico said. \u201cThey went after \u2018The View\u2019 because I went on there. They went after Jimmy Kimmel <\/a>for telling a joke they didn\u2019t like. They went after you for telling the truth about Paramount\u2019s bribe to Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walt Disney Co.-owned ABC temporarily suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live!\u201d <\/a>last fall after Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcast Group, owners of ABC affiliates, said they would not air the talk series because of comments Kimmel made about the suspect in the shooting death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Late Show with Stephen Colbert\u201d is leaving the air<\/a> come May, signaling the end of CBS\u2019 long-standing relationship with the late-night talk show. Its cancellation was a \u201cpurely financial decision,\u201d <\/a> according to CBS. <\/p>\n

But it also came at a time when Paramount Global, which owns CBS, was seeking regulatory approval from the Trump administration to sell itself to Skydance Media. The merger was finalized in August.<\/a><\/p>\n

CBS drew scrutiny over its decision to settle a lawsuit Trump filed against CBS News over edits made to a \u201c60 Minutes\u201d interview with Kamala Harris, his Democratic opponent in the race for the White House.<\/p>\n

The suit was settled for $16 million<\/a> even though most First Amendment experts believed Trump\u2019s claims were frivolous. But getting past the complaint without a lengthy trial was seen as necessary by former CBS News parent Paramount Global to assure regulatory clearance of its merger with Skydance Media.<\/a><\/p>\n

Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Late night comedian Stephen Colbert called out his network, CBS, saying it blocked him from broadcasting an interview…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182224,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[46126,29454,536,73820,11105,1520,48,52,51,86317,86316,47,50,49,6336,20460,42254,26111,86315,2822,18120],"class_list":["post-182223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-carr","tag-cbs","tag-donald-trump","tag-equal-time-rule","tag-fcc","tag-interview","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-late-show","tag-late-night-talk-show","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-paramount","tag-rule","tag-same-time","tag-stephen-colbert","tag-talarico","tag-tv","tag-view"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182223\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}