Michigan Business & Economy

Expert explains how media consolidation allowed Sinclair to control local news stations

Michigan Public | By Stateside Staff

Published April 5, 2018 at 4:37 PM EDT

The rules for broadcast are different than those for cable, explains Lotz.

Stateside's conversation with Amanda Lotz, a professor of media studies at the University of Michigan and a fellow at the Peabody Media Center.

It's the video that has exploded across the internet:

How America's largest local TV owner turned its news anchors into soldiers in Trump's war on the media: https://t.co/iLVtKRQycL pic.twitter.com/dMdSGellH3— Deadspin (@Deadspin) March 31, 2018

Deadspin assembled the clips of dozens of local TV news anchors reading an identical script decrying “fake news.” It was a script they were given to read by their stations’ owner, Sinclair Broadcast Group.

Sinclair’s leadership is right-leaning, it’s supported by President Trump, and the company has a pretty steady track record of pushing political content onto its local TV stations.

Amanda Lotz is a professor of media studies at the University of Michigan and a fellow at the Peabody Media Center.

Lotz joined Stateside to explain the outrage over the video, how the FCC has influenced the rise of big station groups, whether corporate owners can legally control the content of local news, and how Americans can be savvy news consumers.

Listen to the interview above, and click here to see if Sinclair owns your local station.(Subscribe to the Stateside podcast oniTunes,Google Play, or with thisRSS link)