FCC’s Plan for Fixing Its Political Ads Transparency Site? It Won’t Say

When the Federal Communications Commission passed a rule earlier this year to require TV stations to post political ad buying information online, public interest groups (and ProPublica) welcomed the policy as a means to get an unprecedented look at how billions of campaign dollars flow around the country. But, in practice, attempts to create a full picture of political ad spending from the TV station files exposed deep flaws in the FCC’s effort as well as spotty compliance by the stations themselves. “The reviews are abysmal,” says Campaign Legal Center Policy Director Meredith McGehee, who has been tracking the issue closely as a member of the Public Interest Public Airwaves Coalition. “The information posted has not been as helpful as expected.” Now, the commission is refusing to even talk about the future of its own transparency initiative.