C-SPAN Backs Dish Challenge to Government Carriage Mandates

C-SPAN is backing Dish in its effort to get the Supreme Court to overturn Congress' mandate that Dish carry the high definition television feeds of noncommercial TV stations.

Dish last month filed a petition for certiorari, asking the High Court to review a Ninth Circuit Appeals court decision last February upholding a district court's denial of Dish's request for a preliminary injunction against implementing the Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act's (STELA) noncom HD mandate on Dish (Sec. 207). Dish also asked the court to rule on what First Amendment test should apply to the mandate that it carry noncommercial stations in HD in advance of the HD feeds of other stations. At issue, if the Supremes take the case, could be the underpinnings of the entire government must-carry regime. C-SPAN certainly hopes so. "We're trying to make the point that must-carry, in all forms, is unfair and an infringement on our First Amendment rights," said C-SPAN VP and General Counsel Bruce Collins