Ross Lieberman, senior vice president of government affairs for the American Cable Association, which also opposes the deal, said his group will also be targeting the sales prices, among other issues with the sidecar arrangements. “The cheapo deals are what actually may be their undoing,” Simpson said. ![]() Regulators ruled that such low prices indicated that the deals were not legitimate, “arms-length” transactions. (then called Glencairn), citing, in part, sales prices that were too low. “I think it is one of the major issues,” Simpson said, pointing to a 2001 case in which the FCC shot down a set of sidecar deals between Sinclair and Cunningham Broadcasting Corp. “It will be an insult to the public interest if the FCC approves this merger and will undermine the public’s confidence in the commission.”Īs the FCC opens up for comments on the merger next week, John Simpson, a consultant on government relations for Ruddy and NewsMax, said he expects station sale prices to be a prime area of attack. “The Sinclair plan is loaded with sham deals that are not real divestitures,” Ruddy said. Such a “cozy or sweetheart” deal, Kimmelman added, “should really send up an alarm to law enforcers that this is not a real meaningful divestiture of assets.”Ĭhris Ruddy, the CEO of NewsMax, a right-leaning media company that opposes the deal, agrees. “The more stations any one company owns, the more likely consumers will receive reduced diversity of viewpoints, especially from a company like Sinclair that dictates a specific political message,” he said. By maintaining de facto control of the sidecar stations, Sinclair will be able to further spread its conservative message, said Gene Kimmelman, president and CEO of Public Knowledge, a policy group that opposes the deal. Though the FCC has approved these types of sidecar deals in the past, critics have panned them as blatant workarounds for rules designed to keep any single broadcaster from exerting too much influence. Sinclair did not respond to a request for comment. It has nothing to do with Sinclair,” Williams said. “I own my stations, I do whatever I want to do. For his part, Williams insists he has the right not to air any segments or programming he does not approve of. If the deal is approved by the Federal Communications Commission, Sinclair will receive 30 percent of monthly net sales revenue for the stations, in exchange for running advertising and sales for them, maintaining their studios and websites, and offering programming, including the controversial conservative commentary Sinclair requires its own stations to air. In fact, Williams’ deal is not a traditional station sale, but a so-called “ sidecar ” arrangement, which will transfer the three stations’ broadcast licenses - the Seattle station is a Univision affiliate, the Salt Lake one is MYTV, and the Oklahoma station is independent - to his company but still leave Sinclair heavily involved. Concerns about one company’s ownership of two stations in the same market have been magnified by Sinclair’s policy of forcing its stations to run conservative commentary.īut selling to an outspoken conservative buyer with close ties to the company would defeat the purpose of the rules, according to critics of the Sinclair-Tribune merger. ![]() In each of the cities where Williams bought a TV station, Sinclair made the decision to sell in order to satisfy rules prohibiting one company from owning multiple major stations in a single market, subject to a case-by-case review by federal regulators. I’m like Donald Trump I know how to negotiate.” Sometimes you get a break sometimes you get prices that nobody else can get. “That’s what happens when you’ve had a partnership and a relationship for 25 years. ![]() “I know I got a good deal,” said Williams, who is a longtime friend of Sinclair Executive Chairman David Smith. And while Sinclair is shedding stations in hopes of improving its chances of obtaining approval for its mega-purchase of Tribune Media, the company’s recent moves to offer favorable deals to friendly buyers is raising further questions about how much control Sinclair is truly planning to cede, and whether the company is trying to skirt federal rules.
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