This Week in Regulation for Broadcasters: March 9, 2026 to March 13, 2026

By David Oxenford & Keenan Adamchak on March 15, 2026

Posted in Advertising Issues, Broadcast Performance Royalty, Digital Radio, FCC Fees, FM Radio, General FCC, Intellectual Property, Internet Radio, License Renewal, Low Power Television/Class A TV, Music Rights, Noncommercial Broadcasting, On Line Media, Payola and Sponsorship Identification, Programming Regulations, Public Interest Obligations/Localism

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the past week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

Linking to a post from the President complaining about the accuracy of media coverage of the Iran conflict, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr posted the following on X – “Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions – also known as the fake news – have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up. The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will lose their licenses if they do not.” His post went on to say that it was in the best interests of broadcasters to be more accurate in their coverage, citing statistics that suggest that the public does not trust legacy media and providing examples of what he termed “fake news.”
The Copyright Royalty Board this week published in the Federal Register its approval of the settlements between SoundExchange and certain groups of broadcasters. These settlements set royalties to be paid by these broadcasters for the webcasting of sound recordings (including broadcast simulcasts) from January 1, 2026 through December 31, 2030. Settlements covering commercial broadcasters (see our Broadcast Law Blog article here providing more details on this settlement with the NAB), NPR and other CPB stations, webcasting by certain educational institutions, and one noncommercial religious broadcaster were approved. The CRB has yet to publicly release a decision as the royalties to be paid by other webcasters not covered by these settlements, including certain noncommercial broadcasters.
The FCC’s Media Bureau released a Public Notice announcing that it made changes to the call signs of several TV translator stations to bring them into compliance with the FCC’s new rule requiring that all TV translator call signs follow a uniform format (the letter “K” or “W” followed by the channel number and then “-D”) (see our note here). The affected TV translators listed in the Notice will be reissued authorizations with their updated call signs. The Bureau stated that the TV translators listed in the Notice were the only TV translator call signs that needed to be changed under the new rule. The Bureau also reminded licensees of these translators to update the call sign that is transmitted in their on-air station identification.
The FTC released an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking regarding negative option marketing practices, including whether to require sellers to provide “Click to Cancel” options to consumers for cancelling their enrollments in subscriptions and services with “negative options” (contractual terms and conditions allowing a seller to interpret a customer’s silence, or failure to take an affirmative action, as acceptance of an offer to sell and charge for goods or services). In July 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit vacated the FTC’s Click to Cancel Rule (see our note here), finding that the FTC had not fully assessed the impact of and the alternatives to the new rule, which had provided more consumer protections allowing easier cancellation of negative option enrollments (see our note here). In the ANPRM, the FTC asks numerous questions about negative option use, consumer difficulty in using negative option frameworks, and the costs and benefits of new rules. It expressed a general skepticism towards the existing patchwork of laws and rules, which it believes does not provide a consistent legal framework to industry and consumers for implementing and assessing varied negative option marketing uses across different media, but did not propose any new rules. Instead, it highlighted the FTC’s enforcement actions related to unfair cancellation practices.
The FCC’s Office of Managing Director (OMD) released a Public Notice acting on a number of requests by FCC-regulated entities (mostly broadcasters) seeking waiver or deferral of annual regulatory fees. While the OMD historically acted on such requests through individual letter decisions, the OMD announced last September that it would now do so in grouped decisions like this one (see our note here).
The Media Bureau released a Public Notice announcing that April 11 is the deadline for all U.S.-based foreign media outlets classified as “an agent of a foreign government” under the Foreign Agents Registration Act to notify the FCC of their relationship to, and whether the outlet receives any funding from, a foreign government or political party. This obligation applies only to video programmers (other than news organizations) backed by foreign governments or foreign political parties or their agents. The FCC must report to Congress every 6 months on the operations of U.S.-based foreign media outlets, which it will submit on or before May 11. Given the narrow scope of entities covered by this obligation, the FCC often reports that no entity registered (see, for instance, our note here). This reporting requirement should not be confused with the broader obligation of all broadcasters to determine if foreign governments or their agents have bought program time or issue advertising on broadcast stations (see our articles here and here), or the recently adopted rules about reporting broadcast ownership interests of foreign adversaries (which we noted here).