American television host Stephen Colbert slammed his network CBS for denying that it pulled an interview with Rep. James Talarico from The Late Show. On Tuesday night’s broadcast, Colbert said that the network’s lawyers told his staff the segment would not air.
Colbert said the corporation released the press statement without speaking to him.
“Without ever talking to me, the corporation put out this press release,” Colbert said, holding up a printed copy. “This statement, it’s a surprisingly small piece of paper considering how many butts it’s trying to cover.”
In its statement, CBS said: “The Late Show was not prohibited by CBS from broadcasting the interview with Rep. James Talarico. The 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. The Late Show decided to present the interview through its YouTube channel with on-air promotion on the broadcast rather than potentially providing the equal-time options”.
Colbert rejected the claim and said that lawyers for the network informed the show’s staff “in no uncertain terms” on Monday that the interview would not be aired in compliance with the Federal Communications Commission’s “equal time” rule.
The rule generally requires broadcast networks to provide comparable airtime to political candidates during election periods.
He said that “every word” of Monday’s script had been cleared by CBS lawyers before the Talarico interview was abruptly dropped. Colbert also claimed he received additional legal notes during a commercial break about how he could discuss the pulled segment, something that has “never happened before” in the 11 seasons of The Late Show.
Describing the network’s statement as reading like it was “written by and, I’m guessing, for lawyers,” Colbert mocked the suggestion that the show could have booked other guests.
“Fellas, I am well aware that we can book other guests,” he said. “I didn’t need to be presented with that option. I’ve had Jasmine Crockett on my show twice. I could prove that to you, but the network won’t let me show you her picture without including her opponents. So I guess I’ll just have to show you this picture of Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein instead.”
Colbert added that there has “long been an exception to this rule” for talk shows such as The Late Show. Although FCC Chair Brendan Carr has not eliminated the exception, he said CBS is “unilaterally enforcing it as if he had”.
Referring to the network’s explanation, Colbert said the decision to drop the interview was made “for purely financial reasons”.
“So I don’t know what this is about. For the record, I’m not even mad. I really don’t want an adversarial relationship with the network,” Colbert said. “As I said last night, in my interview with James Talarico — check it out, it’s on YouTube, it’s pretty good — I said to him I’m grateful to have worked at CBS for the last 11 years and worked with George [Cheeks] and David [Stapf] and Amy [Reisenbach] and everyone at the network, the Sheldons of every age, the Matlocks of every sex. I’m just so surprised that this giant global corporation would not stand up to these bullies”.
“Let’s just call this what it is. Donald Trump’s administration wants to silence anyone who says anything bad about Trump on TV, because all Trump does is watch TV. He’s like a toddler with too much screen time. He gets cranky and then drops a load in his diapers. So it’s no surprise that two of the people most affected by this threat are me and my friend Jimmy Kimmel,” the host added.