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Free Press Calls on Chairman Pai to Recuse Himself from Sinclair Proceeding Following News of Investigation
Free Press on Thursday called on Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to recuse himself from all decisions related to the Sinclair Broadcast Group's proposed takeover of Tribune Media. The demand follows news today that the FCC Inspector General's office is investigating the appearance of quid pro quo behind agency rulings that have helped pave the way for the proposed merger. Rep.
WASHINGTON
Free Press on Thursday called on Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to recuse himself from all decisions related to the Sinclair Broadcast Group's proposed takeover of Tribune Media. The demand follows news today that the FCC Inspector General's office is investigating the appearance of quid pro quo behind agency rulings that have helped pave the way for the proposed merger. Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey has spearheaded efforts in Congress to call for this inevstigation.
A coalition of public-interest groups, including CREDO Action, Daily Kos, Demand Progress, Free Press and MPower Change, have collected more than 400,000 petitions calling on the FCC to block the merger and investigate Chairman Pai's conduct. Following today's news, these groups are also calling on Pai to recuse himself from all agency matters involving Sinclair.
Free Press has raised serious concerns that the FCC chairman was acting deliberately and with extreme bias to lift any public-interest safeguards that would prevent the massive merger from being approved. In August 2017, Free Press filed a formal challenge to the proposed deal stating that the transfer of station licenses would give Sinclair a broadcast reach far in excess of congressional and FCC limits on national and local media ownership, and would harm the public interest.
As originally proposed, the deal would add 42 Tribune stations to the Sinclair empire, including stations in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, Denver and several other top-20 markets. Sinclair already owns 173 stations dominating many other major cities, such as Baltimore, Minneapolis, Seattle, St. Louis and Washington, D.C., as well several stations in key electoral states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
If the merger is approved, the conservative broadcaster would be able to air politically biased programming to more than 70 percent of the U.S. population.
Consolidation on this scale is conceivable only following 2017 rule changes by Pai's FCC. In April, the agency voted to reinstate a technically obsolete loophole called the UHF discount that allows broadcast conglomerates to exceed congressionally mandated national TV-audience coverage limits. Free Press sued to overturn that decision, and oral arguments are scheduled for April in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
This loosening of broadcast-ownership rules came after press reports that Chairman Pai had conducted meetings with Sinclair executives days after the Nov. 8 presidential election, and then again off FCC grounds days before Trump appointed him to chair the FCC. At the same time, Politico reported that Donald Trump's adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, was boasting privately about a deal he had struck with the broadcaster during the campaign to air interviews with Trump un-interrupted by commentary.
Free Press Deputy Director and Senior Counsel Jessica J. Gonzalez made the following statement:
"Until the inspector general's investigation is complete, Chairman Pai and any other FCC staff subject to this inquiry should recuse themselves from all dealings related to Sinclair's proposed takeover of Tribune Media. If the investigation finds that Pai or any other FCC staff did indeed let their own bias and favoritism shape decisions related to the deal, they must not be permitted to vote on this matter and they should be subject to other appropriate ethics-review processes.
"The publicly available evidence suggests a pattern of abuse where Sinclair forces its local stations to air pro-Trump messages in exchange for policy favors from the Trump administration and its FCC chairman. This should be a national scandal. If the deal is allowed to proceed, it would expand the company's long-standing pattern of evading public-interest obligations and abusing its market power to score political points, spread propaganda and serve a right-wing political agenda.
"The FCC rules against media consolidation were put in place for a reason: to promote localism, diversity and competition via access to the local airwaves. Pai's actions in support of this enormous merger blatantly violate both the spirit and the letter of this central mandate. Approving this deal would do real harm to low-income families and people of color. It would turn Sinclair into a media colossus with the power to spread xenophobic and racist pro-Trump messages that threaten these communities. Pai must recuse himself and this deal must be rejected."
Free Press was created to give people a voice in the crucial decisions that shape our media. We believe that positive social change, racial justice and meaningful engagement in public life require equitable access to technology, diverse and independent ownership of media platforms, and journalism that holds leaders accountable and tells people what's actually happening in their communities.
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'The IPO Is Being Engineered': 12-Minute Video Details Growing Fears Over Elon Musk Plot to Become World's First Trillionaire
As the Trump-backed oligarch tries to grow even more wealthy and with longstanding rules changed to his benefit ahead of the SpaceX public offering, "retirees could take huge losses, while insiders cash out."
May 28, 2026
Billionaire Elon Musk has ambitions to become the world's first trillionaire when his company SpaceX makes what is expected to be the biggest initial public offering in history—and money unwittingly invested by ordinary Americans may help him get there.
Progressive media outlet More Perfect Union on Wednesday published a video detailing how the Nasdaq stock market exchange changed its own rules so that SpaceX can be immediately included in index funds without having to wait through the one-year "seasoning" period that used to be required for newly public companies.
The reason companies in the past had to wait a year to be included in index funds is that such funds contain a large chunk of Americans' retirement savings, and are thus supposed to be more averse to risk.
Watch the 12-minute video:
NEW: Elon Musk wants a SpaceX IPO valuing the company at upwards of $1.75 trillion.
To get there he got the rules changed so that index funds, with millions of Americans' retirement savings, are forced to buy in.
Retirees could take huge losses, while insiders cash out. pic.twitter.com/DviJEt0XAu
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) May 27, 2026
This means that ordinary investors could see their money plunged into an unproven company while investors who have bankrolled Musk's previous ventures now rolled into SpaceX could cash out at inflated prices.
"Every piece of evidence we have is that the IPO is being engineered to rise very rapidly after it prices, and then fall very dramatically after that," George Pearkes, global macro strategist for Bespoke Investment Group, told More Perfect Union. "That is a recipe for retail investors, especially, to take large losses."
SpaceX is a particularly risky bet, Preakes added, given that it is seeking a $1.75 trillion valuation with its IPO. For a company that made only $19 billion in profits last fiscal year, critics say a valuation 54 times larger than its projected revenue multiple, a measure of its value based on expected future earnings, is a huge red flag.
"This combination of extreme size and this extreme multiple," Peakes said, "is completely unprecedented."
Pearkes isn't in the only expert concerned about the structure of the SpaceX IPO.
Writing at Seeking Alpha, independent equity researcher Julia Ostian similarly argued that the SpaceX IPO is structured using a "calculated mechanism that will feed the artificial demand generated by the forced index fund buyers," and thus at least initially send share values soaring beyond what the company's fundamentals would suggest, and giving insiders an opportunity to quickly cash out.
Ostian added that "it is clear who is the beneficiary here and who pays the price for this engineered system," and said that "the rich are getting richer openly, without hiding it or even without trying to pretend it’s something else."
As More Perfect Union emphasized, the entire IPO was orchestrated by Musk for maximum advantage to himself and his closest allies, but he needed regular Americans to put up the money for the scheme to work.
"He got the rules changed so that index funds, with millions of Americans' retirement savings, are forced to buy in," the outlet noted. "Retirees could take huge losses, while insiders cash out."
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Report Highlights 'Uniquely Poor Performance' of US For-Profit Health System Compared to Others
"We know what high-performing health systems look like—other countries have them and are building them. It’s high time the US did better.”
May 28, 2026
An annual analysis that examines healthcare systems across nearly two dozen wealthy countries around the world once again highlighted the United States' "uniquely poor performance relative to its peers," with this year's US Health Care from a Global Perspective report focusing on "insurance coverage and access to care, affordability of care, delivery of care, and equity of health outcomes."
As advocates for expanding the US Medicare system to the entire population have long warned, the country's for-profit healthcare system—which ties the ability to get care to one's employment and allows insurance companies to boost profits by denying care to patients—"The US, on average, has the poorest health outcomes of any high-income country," the Commonwealth Fund's report reads.
The report examines the US system compared with other countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), including the United Kingdom, France, New Zealand, Japan, and Mexico.
It finds that the US spent 18% of its gross domestic product on healthcare in 2024—nearly twice the OECD average.
Life expectancy in the US reached an all-time high in 2024, but was still among the shortest when compared to the 19 other countries, nearly five years shorter than Japan, Spain, and Switzerland, and longer than the average lifespan in Turkey and Mexico.
While the US and Mexico also both rank high on the list in terms of preventable deaths, the latter nation announced last month that it would soon be joining every other country included in the analysis by shifting to a universal, government-run healthcare system.
In the United States, the for-profit health sector—which spent a record $877.69 million on lobbying last year—contributes to the high number of avoidable deaths, which stands at 312 per 100,000 people. About 27 million Americans are still uninsured, more than 16 years after the passage of the Affordable Care Act, and the Republican Party's refusal to continue ACA subsidies last year as well as its $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts over the next decade, according to Thursday's report, are "projected to increase the number of uninsured Americans by an additional 17 million by 2034, potentially leading to more than 50,000 additional preventable deaths annually."
"By contrast, Mexico’s recently established Universal Health Service will provide all residents with access to free care at any public health institute, starting in 2027," the report states. "The US is one of the only countries to have enacted policies that reduce coverage."
High out-of-pocket costs may also contribute to poor outcomes and the high number of preventable deaths in the US, the Commonwealth Fund suggests. Americans spend $400 per person, per year, on out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs, while people in France spend $100.
"The US is one of the only countries to have enacted policies that reduce coverage."
"In the US, where approximately 8% of the population is uninsured and one-quarter has coverage that comes with high out-of-pocket costs or deductibles, people are far more likely to forgo needed care because of costs than people in peer countries," reads the report. "This can mean not filling prescriptions, not obtaining diagnostic tests, treatment, or follow-up care, or being unable to adhere to clinician-recommended care plans."
The report also identifies the US as a country that lags behind its peers in producing new doctors, contributing to a crisis in primary care, with the US having the fewest number of primary care providers per 1,000 people. The country also has the "highest medical tuition fees of any country in our analysis," said the Commonwealth Fund.
The organization also found that in 2023, the US had nearly 19 maternal deaths for every 100,000 live births, representing a decline for the country that has long had "among the highest rates of maternal deaths related to complications of pregnancy and childbirth."
"By contrast, in 11 of the 18 countries we studied there were less than five maternal deaths per 100,000 live births," reads the report, which also notes that in the US, maternal mortality is "exceptionally high" among Black women, at 50 deaths per 100,000 live births.
"This far exceeds national maternal mortality in any of the other countries," the report states. "Inequities in access to care and patients’ care experiences—often rooted in discrimination and clinician bias—may be prime contributing factors."
Dr. Joseph Betancourt, president of the Commonwealth Fund, noted that "the US has long prided itself on having the best healthcare in the world, but the population benefits from this excellence unevenly, and it remains largely out of reach for many Americans."
"We spend more than any other nation on healthcare, so our poorer health outcomes aren’t due to a lack of resources—it is about how we choose to use them," said Betancourt. "We know what high-performing health systems look like—other countries have them and are building them. It’s high time the US did better."
"Other countries have shown that alternatives work. What’s striking isn’t the absence of solutions; it’s our reluctance to implement them."
The report does not explicitly call on the US to shift to a universal, government-funded healthcare system, but studies have shown that expanding Medicare to the entire US population, as lawmakers including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) have consistently demanded, would address many of the problems listed in the report.
Studies by the Congressional Budget Office and Yale University have shown that Medicare for All would save an estimated $650 billion and prevent 68,000 avoidable deaths each year.
The policy, which has been proposed in Congress numerous times, is also broadly popular; 65% of US voters—including 78% of Democrats, 71% of Independents, and 49% of Republicans—support creating a national, government-run healthcare program, according to a Data for Progress poll last year.
Despite this, both Republican and Democratic lawmakers continue to insist the proposal is unpopular and too expensive, with Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-8), who is running against vehement Medicare for All advocate Abdul El-Sayed in the Democratic US Senate primary, insisting recently that "the support for a true single-payer system isn't there yet."
Reginald Williams II, senior vice president at Commonwealth Fund, emphasized that it is "not inevitable" that "Americans pay more for healthcare and get less in return."
"It’s the result of different choices," he said. "Other countries have shown that alternatives work. What’s striking isn’t the absence of solutions; it’s our reluctance to implement them. The failure of the US health system is not a failure of ideas. It’s a failure of will to act on them.”
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‘A War Criminal Admitting to His Crimes’: Netanyahu Says He Ordered Military to Seize 70% of Gaza
The head of a pro-Israel lobbying group called it "a blatant violation of the ceasefire and clear undermining of any plan for post-conflict Gaza."
May 28, 2026
As Israel expands its control over the Gaza Strip in violation of last year's ceasefire agreement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that he had ordered the military to take over even more territory.
During a conference at the Ein Prat pre-military academy in an illegal Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank, the prime minister acknowledged that Israel has gradually expanded its control over Gaza since the ceasefire agreement was implemented in October.
"We are now in 60% of the Gaza Strip, more or less. We were at 50%; now we’ve moved to 60%," he told the crowd.
"My directive," he continued, "is to move to—"
Members of the audience then interrupted with shouts of "100! 100!"
"Wait, let's go in order," Netanyahu responded. "First 70%. Let's start with that."
The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor has said Israel's expansion of control in Gaza and construction of fortified military sites “directly contradicts the requirements of the second phase of the ceasefire agreement" and is creating conditions of "de facto annexation."
That agreement required Israeli forces to withdraw behind a so-called "yellow line" that left the military occupying about 53% of the country. Even that occupation was meant to be temporary, with later stages of the agreement involving a full pullout of Israeli troops as Hamas and other militant groups in the strip disarm.
But in recent months, the opposite has happened. The Israel Defense Forces have gradually pushed the yellow line deeper into Palestinian territory to the point where it encompasses more than 60% of the coastal strip, leaving Palestinians near the yellow line to wake up and learn they are in an "open-fire zone" where they can be shot on sight.
According to data from the United Nations Human Rights Office shared with Reuters on Wednesday, 152 Palestinians—comprising 102 men, 15 women, and 35 children—had been killed near the boundary during the ceasefire period up to February 5, which the office's head said raises "serious concerns that the Israeli army is shooting at and killing presumed civilians simply on the basis of their proximity to the so-called yellow line."
Netanyahu's remark follows Israel's orders on Wednesday for more than 200,000 residents of southern Lebanon to forcibly evacuate north of the Zahrani River despite an ongoing ceasefire that began last month.
Israel has systematically razed villages across southern Lebanon since the beginning of March, gradually pushing northward to the point where it now effectively controls about a fifth of the country's territory.
Those ordered to flee their homes on Wednesday joined more than 1 million Lebanese already forcibly displaced by Israel's forced expulsion orders and bombardments. More than 3,200 Lebanese have been killed, including hundreds of women and children.
Israel's far-right settler movement—represented in the Netanyahu government by figures like Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich—speaks openly about ethnically cleansing Gaza and Lebanon of their residents to make way for permanent Israeli settlers, in a similar fashion to the intensifying annexation of the West Bank.
On Wednesday, Defense Minister Israel Katz said that Israel was pushing for the mass “voluntary migration” of Palestinians from Gaza and said the government would implement a plan for it “at the right time and in the right manner."
Human rights groups have said that the creation of unlivable conditions in Gaza to push its residents to leave would amount to the war crime of forced transfer.
Itay Epshtain, an Israeli expert in international law and the law of armed conflict, said Katz had "publicly committed himself to the mass deportation of Palestinians from Gaza" and that "members of Israel’s government openly endorsed conduct in gross and systemic breach of peremptory norms of international law."
Netanyahu, meanwhile, has previously expressed sympathy for the idea of "Greater Israel," which involves the expansion of the nation's borders to conquer all or part of current-day Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia in accordance with Biblical descriptions.
The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu for war crimes and crimes against humanity during Israel's genocidal military campaign in Gaza, and is reportedly taking actions against Smotrich and Ben-Gvir as well.
Dylan Williams, the vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy, said that Netanyahu's pledge on Thursday to further expand Israel's territorial control in Gaza was "a war criminal admitting to his crimes."
Ilan Goldberg, the senior vice president of the pro-Israel lobbying group JStreet, said plans to expand were "a blatant violation of the ceasefire and clear undermining of any plan for post-conflict Gaza."
"Yes, Hamas needs to disarm," he said. "But Israel cannot be launching plans to retake all of Gaza."
Owen Jones, a British journalist, lamented the lack of coverage of the slow-motion ethnic cleansing in the Western press.
"Israel doesn't try to hide its crimes. It broadcasts them to the world, knowing it has impunity," he said on Thursday. "Netanyahu boasts of annexing Gaza. Yesterday, his defense minister said the plan was to remove Gaza's population. No front page headlines. No Western denunciations."
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