NAB Seeks Emergency Stay of Online Political File Rules

The National Association of Broadcasters Tuesday asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to block the Federal Communications Commission's implementation of its online political file rules, the latest in a series of broadcaster moves to try and stop the FCC from posting individual TV station political spot prices online when cable and satellite competitors have no similar online reporting requirement.

Scheduled to take effect Aug. 2, the rules require the top four network affiliated stations in the top 50 markets to start sending any information they must keep in their station paper political files, including spot prices, to the FCC for posting in a national, online database. The FCC will do a year-in check of the process then plans to apply the requirement to all TV stations a year after that. In its petition, NAB, which has already asked the same court to overturn the rules and the FCC to stay enforcement of them, said the emergency stay was warranted because it is likely to win its court challenge on the merits and that it is likely to suffer competitive harms if there is no stay -- essentially the same arguments it made to the FCC in calling for it to postpone enforcement until the court weighs in.