Senators probe DirecTV’s decision to drop Newsmax

Senate Republican told DirecTV and its parent companies Wednesday to explain why it dropped the Newsmax channel from its lineup and whether the decision was politically motivated.

The lawmakers said the decision, which prompted a furor among conservatives, comes after DirecTV dropped another channel, One America News Network (OANN), in early 2022 and amid broad concern about censorship of conservative views on social medial channels.

“It appears that this decision may be the latest example of big business suppressing politically disfavored speech at the behest of liberal Democrats,” Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Mike Lee of Utah and Tom Cotton of Arkansas wrote in a letter to DirecTV. “Congress and the public have a right to know the extent to which DirecTV’s decision to drop Newsmax was politically motivated, including whether the company succumbed to pressure from administration officials or Democrats in Congress.”

Newsmax said that its channel went dark at midnight on Jan. 24, shutting off its reach to more than 13 million customers of DirecTV, DirecTV Stream and U-Verse. The network denounced the move as politically motivated.

“This is a blatant act of political discrimination and censorship against Newsmax,” network CEO Christopher Ruddy said.

DirecTV’s decision followed a breakdown in negotiations over rates. Newsmax sought cable licensing fees, but DirecTV said its arrangement allowed Newsmax to “generate considerable advertising revenue at no cost.”

“On multiple occasions, we made it clear to Newsmax that we wanted to continue to offer the network, but ultimately Newsmax’s demands for rate increases would have led to significantly higher costs that we would have to pass on to our broad customer base,” a DirecTV spokesperson said.

Carriage disputes are increasingly common as cable providers struggle to hang on to subscribers while competing with streaming services and other outlets, but DirecTV’s decision to dump two networks that feature conservative political commentary pushed the squabble into the political realm.

The senators said it smacks of a double standard.

“It has been alleged that DirecTV pays substantial sums to numerous channels that are politically left-of-center, even when those channels have substantially lower ratings than Newsmax,” they wrote. “And, it has been alleged that DirecTV refused to pay any net sums whatsoever to Newsmax — and expressly stated that it never would pay any net sums to Newsmax — even though explicitly liberal stations with substantially fewer viewers were receiving millions of dollars from DirecTV.”

They sent their letter to DirecTV and AT&T, which owns a 70% stake in DirecTV, and TPG, which owns 30%.

The senators want an accounting of any fees DirecTV pays to other channels and whether they have higher or lower ratings than Newsmax.

They also want any communications about Newsmax, OANN and Fox News between or among DirecTV, TPG and AT&T employees with federal, state or local government officials, the White House and the campaign arms of the Democratic Party to see if there had been outside pressure to drop the channels.

The senators said they expect answers to their requests by Feb. 15.

• Valerie Richardson contributed to this report.