US FCC head says controversial Trump ads do not raise concerns

Series of publicly-funded television spots have been criticised by Republicans and Democrats as self-promotion by Trump.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr departs an event in the East Room of the White House, on March 20, 2026, in Washington [Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP]

A series of taxpayer-funded advertisements that critics say are political campaign spots for United States President Donald Trump are not improper and do not need to be reviewed, according to the head of the country’s broadcast regulator.

“There’s nothing in there that strikes me to merit any sort of FCC review,” Brendan Carr, who Trump appointed as head of the Federal Communications Commission, said on Wednesday.

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Carr likened the advertisements to public service announcements, echoing an argument the White House has made in response to criticism that Trump was using public funding to promote himself and his policies. Media freedom groups have criticised Carr for helping Trump to “weaponise” the FCC to go after news and television networks whose coverage of him he has not been happy with.

The US Constitution bars Trump from running for a third term as president, but he has nevertheless floated a third stint in the White House and has promoted merchandise bearing the words “Trump 2028”.

“The announcements are very clearly not campaign ads,” the White House said in a statement last week defending the campaign. “President Trump is not on the ballot, and there is no call to action. Instead, the announcements are a reminder for Americans to love their country and know why it’s worth defending — at home, at the border, and abroad.”

Bipartisan condemnation of advertisement campaign

On Tuesday, Democratic senators wrote to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) asking it to stop spending funds on a series of television advertisements promoting the Trump administration’s recent actions.

“These ads need to immediately come off the air, taxpayers need to be paid back for this theft, and everyone responsible needs to be held accountable for this corrupt and illegal propaganda,” Senators Patty Murray and Chris Murphy wrote in a letter to the agency’s head. The lawmakers said DHS was planning to spend $20m on the advertisements.

But criticism of the television spots has come from prominent Democrats as well as Republican lawmakers, who have said the campaign appears to violate legal provisions meant to bar publicly funded political propaganda.

Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from North Carolina, said the advertisements resembled something former Hungarian leader Viktor Orban would put out.

Republican Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota said he agreed with the message in one of the advertisements, but “it shouldn’t be paid for with taxpayer dollars”.

Some Democrats have been more direct, saying the administration could face criminal liability for its actions. “This may be felony criminal theft and conversion of government property for political campaign purposes,” Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, wrote on X, citing a Trump advertisement that aired recently.

Raskin said any government employees who worked on it could have violated the Hatch Act, a 1939 law that specifically prohibits government employees from engaging in political activities.

The advertisements have aired on national television during national sports matches and other highly-watched programming.

One advertisement is a monochrome video featuring Trump walking down a hall in slow motion. In an audio clip taken from his last presidential election campaign, Trump can be heard saying Americans are now engaged in a “final battle” and that he and his supporters will “demolish the deep state, expel the warmongers from our government, we will drive out the globalists, we will cast out the communists, Marxists and fascists”.

In another advertisement, a montage of Trump is shown with audio of him saying, “Together, we will defeat communism, socialism, and Marxism,” before text in red capital letters notes a series of claimed accomplishments like “largest tax cuts in American history” and “reigniting American manufacturing”.

The advertisement is set to a song titled Love Me by artist JMSN, who wrote last week on X that Trump had used it without permission. Lawyers representing the artist wrote to the White House on Monday, saying they would take further action if the music was not removed from the video. JMSN, the letter said “does not want to be viewed as directly or indirectly affiliated with the President or his Administration.”

一系列由公共资金资助的电视广告被共和党人和民主党人批评为特朗普的自我宣传。

美国联邦通信委员会主席布伦丹·卡尔于2026年3月20日离开位于华盛顿白宫东厅的活动。[朱莉娅·德马雷·尼金森/美联社]

据该国广播监管机构负责人称，一系列由纳税人资助、被批评人士称为美国总统唐纳德·特朗普政治竞选广告的广告并无不妥之处，无需审查。

“在我看来，里面没有任何内容值得联邦通信委员会进行任何形式的审查，”特朗普任命的联邦通信委员会主席布伦丹·卡尔周三表示。

ABC新闻称，联邦通信委员会正在开展恐吓活动，以左右新闻报道（共3条，第1条）。

特朗普威胁要向广播监管机构举报记者克里斯汀·韦尔克（Kristen Welker）的事件（共3条，此为第2条）

特朗普表示，他计划在中期选举前进行32天的竞选活动（共3条）。

卡尔将这些广告比作公益广告，这与白宫此前针对特朗普利用公共资金宣传自己及其政策的批评所作出的回应不谋而合。媒体自由组织批评卡尔帮助特朗普“利用”联邦通信委员会（FCC）打击那些他不满意的新闻和电视网络。

美国宪法禁止特朗普竞选第三个总统任期，但他仍然暗示可能第三次入主白宫，并推销印有“特朗普 2028”字样的商品。

白宫上周发表声明为此次活动辩护，称“这些公告显然不是竞选广告。特朗普总统并未参选，也没有号召民众采取行动。相反，这些公告旨在提醒美国民众热爱自己的国家，并了解为何国家值得捍卫——无论是在国内、边境还是国外。”

两党共同谴责该广告宣传活动

周二，民主党参议员致信国土安全部，要求其停止将资金用于一系列宣传特朗普政府近期举措的电视广告。

“这些广告必须立即停播，纳税人的钱必须得到赔偿，所有相关责任人都必须为这种腐败非法的宣传承担责任，”参议员帕蒂·默里和克里斯·墨菲在致该机构负责人的信中写道。两位议员表示，国土安全部计划在这些广告上花费2000万美元。

但一些知名的民主党人和共和党议员也对这些电视广告提出了批评，他们表示，该宣传活动似乎违反了旨在禁止公共资金资助的政治宣传的法律规定。

北卡罗来纳州共和党参议员汤姆·蒂利斯表示，这些广告很像匈牙利前领导人维克托·欧尔班会发布的那种广告。

南达科他州共和党参议院多数党领袖约翰·图恩表示，他同意其中一则广告中的信息，但“不应该用纳税人的钱来支付”。

一些民主党人的措辞更为直接，称政府可能因其行为承担刑事责任。众议院司法委员会首席民主党议员杰米·拉斯金在X网站上撰文指出：“这可能构成重罪，即为政治竞选目的而盗窃和挪用政府财产。”他援引了特朗普最近播出的一则竞选广告。

拉斯金表示，任何参与该项目的政府雇员都可能违反了《哈奇法案》，这是一项 1939 年的法律，明确禁止政府雇员参与政治活动。

这些广告曾在国家级体育赛事和其他高收视率节目期间在国家电视台播出。

其中一则广告是一段黑白视频，画面中特朗普以慢动作走过一条走廊。在一段取自他上次总统竞选活动的音频片段中，可以听到特朗普说美国人现在正处于一场“最后的战斗”中，他和他的支持者将“摧毁深层政府，将战争贩子驱逐出政府，我们将赶走全球主义者，我们将驱逐共产主义者、马克思主义者和法西斯分子”。

在另一则广告中，播放了一段特朗普的蒙太奇画面，配以他的音频：“我们将团结起来，战胜共产主义、社会主义和马克思主义”，随后用红色大写字母列出了一系列他声称的成就，例如“美国历史上最大规模的减税”和“重振美国制造业”。

这则广告配乐是歌手JMSN的歌曲《Love Me》。JMSN上周在X网站上发文称，特朗普未经许可使用了这首歌。周一，JMSN的律师致信白宫，表示如果视频中不移除这首歌，他们将采取进一步行动。信中还提到，JMSN“不希望被视为与总统或其政府有任何直接或间接的关联”。