FCC Takes Junkets at Industry Expense

The Center’s database shows that broadcasting giants such as Viacom, Clear Channel and Comcast already dominate many of the nation’s media markets, but it is the cozy relationship between the telecommunications industry and the FCC that stands at the heart of the Center's report.

According to that report, FCC officials have taken more than 2,500 trips paid for by companies and trade groups from the telecommunications and broadcasting industries during the past eight years. The sponsorship paid for FCC commissioners and staff members to attend a dizzying array of conventions, conferences and other events in exotic locations including Paris, Hong Kong and Rio de Janeiro.

The top overall destination, according to the report, was Las Vegas, with 330 trips. Second was New Orleans with 173 trips and third was New York with 102 trips. Trailing at fourth on the travel parade was London, which FCC officials visited 98 times. Other popular destinations included Orlando, San Francisco, Miami, Anchorage, Palm Springs, Buenos Aires and Beijing.

Although the industry-sponsored FCC officials often participated as speakers or one-time panelists at the events, many times their only status was as attendees. Even when scheduled to speak or serve on a panel, the junkets included the full ride at the full event.

According to the report, which is entitled “Well-Connected,” FCC Chairman Michael K. Powell, the son of the Secretary of State, led the charge as to accumulating the most industry sponsored travel and entertainment among active commissioners. His individual tally: 44 trips costing $84,921.

Powell, who was sworn in as a member of the Commission on November 3, 1997 and designated chairman by President Bush on January 22, 2001, is on record as favoring doing away with most or all of the current ownership restrictions, arguing that the regulations are outdated in the modern era of the Internet, cable and satellite broadcasting.

Powell scheduled the June 2 meeting on the ownership rules, despite criticism from consumer groups and fellow commissioners Jonathan S. Adelstein and Michael J. Copps, who formally requested a delay, citing that the matter had not been properly aired in public hearings.

“Media ownership rules are intended to protect and advance the cherished values of diversity, localism and competition,” Powell wrote in response to the delay request. “These values and the public interest, however, are ill-served by letting stand a body of rules that are unenforceable. When the judiciary reverses our rules, especially ones intended to promote core First Amendment values, it is incumbent on us to repair the shortcomings as quickly as possible.”

Prior to the FCC, Powell served as chief of staff of the Antitrust Division in the Department of Justice. He was also an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of the law firm of O'Melveny & Myers LLP, where he specialized in telecommunications, antitrust and employment law.

According to the report, the biggest industry sponsor of the trips was the National Association of Broadcasters, which paid $191,472 to bring 206 FCC officials to its events. The NAB has lobbied to keep the current FCC rules limiting media ownership in place.

Other trip sponsors include:

Before any rule changes go into effect, the report points out that there is already plenty of consolidation in the industry: The three largest local phone companies control 83 percent of home telephone lines. The top two long distance carriers control 67 percent of that market. The four biggest cellular phone companies have 64 percent of the wireless market, while the five largest cable companies serve programming to 74 percent of the cable subscribers nationwide.