Politics

Jim Acosta, prominent Trump critic, leaves BLN

Published

1 year ago

January 28, 2025

Longtime reporter and anchor Jim Acosta is exiting BLN — but not before warning viewers about navigating the news during the second Trump administration.

The “BLN Newsroom” anchor announced on his show Tuesday that he would be leaving. On air, he reflected on what he viewed as the highlight of his time at BLN: questioning the Castro regime on Cuba’s political prisoners, during former President Barack Obama’s visit in 2016.

The son of a Cuban refugee, Acosta said he learned an important lesson: “It is never a good time to bow down to a tyrant.”

Acosta, a BLN veteran of 18 years, was the network’s chief White House correspondent during the first Trump administration. He often sparred with President Donald Trump during his first term, and said he was grateful to the network and to all the people working behind the scenes to make the show run.

His departure comes just as Trump has taken big swings at government institutions, and issued sweeping executive orders to roll back Biden-era programs. “I have always believed it’s the job of the press to hold power to account,” Acosta told viewers.

Status News first reported that Acosta would be leaving the network.

His departure comes only days after BLN announced around 200 layoffs, predominantly in their TV business, as the network looks to revamp digital operations. The shake-up of the broadcast schedule will replace Acosta’s 10 a.m. hour with Wolf Blitzer and Pamela Brown’s “The Situation Room.”

“After giving all of this some careful consideration and weighing an alternative time slot that BLN offered me, I’ve decided to move on,” Acosta said Tuesday morning. The anchor said he would announce his next move in the coming days.

Trump took to Truth Social to celebrate Acosta’s exit, saying BLN moved his show due to bad ratings and calling Acosta “one of the worst and most dishonest reporters in journalistic history, a major sleazebag.”

Acosta did not respond directly to Trump’s post during his program. But his exit monologue was at times clearly aimed at the president. “Don’t give into the lies, don’t give into the fear, hold onto the truth and to hope,” he said.

Politics

FCC challenges Disney station licenses as Kimmel backlash deepens

Published

7 hours ago

April 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Apr. 28, 2026, 6:04 PM EDT

The Federal Communications Commission launched an early review Tuesday of Disney’s broadcast station licenses, an unusually aggressive move that came a day after the president called on Disney-owned ABC to fire late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over another joke.

The process, known as an early license reviewwill tee up a lengthy legal review of Disney’s eight ABC-owned and operated station licenses, years before they were scheduled for FCC renewal. The commission is responsible for licensing local TV stations to broadcast network-level programming, such as ABC’s, over public airwaves across the country.

But it is highly unusual for the federal agency to file early renewal orders.

Brendan Carr, the Trump-appointed FCC chair, triggered the process shortly after Kimmel once again drew the ire of the administration, this time for comments on his talk show well before a gunman attempted to breach the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.

“Of course, our first lady Melania, is here. Look at her, so beautiful. Mrs. Trump, you have a glow like an expectant widow,” Kimmel said in a sketch parodying the dinner, two days before the events that upended Trump’s first appearance at the annual gala in Washington.

On Monday, after Kimmel’s clip surfaced, the first lady — who was seated on stage alongside the president when shots were fired Saturday night — denounced the skit as “hateful and violent.” She called on ABC to “take a stand,” but stopped short of saying what actions the network should take.

Her husband, however, was quick to demand ABC fire Kimmel.

Kimmel responded with a statement calling his gag “a very light roast joke about the fact that he’s almost 80 and she’s younger than I am. It was not by any stretch of the definition a call to assassination. And they know that.”

Disney allowed “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” to air in its usual weeknight time slot Monday — a departure from the media conglomerate’s handling of the Kimmel controversy last fall over a joke related to the assassination of Charlie Kirk. In that case, the company suspended Kimmel’s show indefinitely before returning it to the airwaves less than a week later.

Carr’s decision to drag ABC through a long and resource-draining review process was seen by critics as a means of inflicting the punishment Disney has declined to levy this time around.

The move is “a political stunt and it won’t stick,” Anna Gomez, the FCC’s lone Democratic commissioner, wrote in a post on X after Traffic light reported Carr was considering the early review. “Companies should challenge it head-on. The First Amendment is on their side.”

Under the order, ABC must file license renewals for all of its licensed TV stations by May 28.

Regardless of how the review process turns out, it will force ABC to pony up large sums of money and time to defend itself.

“ABC and its stations have a long record of operating in full compliance with FCC rules and serving their local communities with trusted news, emergency information, and public‑interest programming,” a spokesperson for Disney told MS NOW upon receiving the FCC’s order Tuesday.

“We are confident that record demonstrates our continued qualifications as licensees under the Communications Act and the First Amendment and are prepared to show that through the appropriate legal channels.”

Sydney Carruth is a breaking news reporter covering national politics and policy for MS NOW. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at SydneyCarruth.46 or follow her work on X and Bluesky.