Senate president calls for probe into Arizona PBS’s 2022 election coverage | Arizona Capitol Times

Key Points:

• Senate President Warren Petersen asks FCC to investigate KAET-TV

• KAET-TV gave Katie Hobbs an interview despite her refusal to debate Kari Lake

• Petersen claims that move violated an agreement between KAET-TV and the Citizens Clean Elections Commission

Senate President Warren Petersen is asking the Federal Communications Commission to investigate KAET-TV, the Phoenix PBS affiliate, with an eye on revoking the station’s license.

In a letter to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, the Gilbert Republican said the station acted improperly in its 2022 decision to give a half-hour interview to Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Katie Hobbs even after she refused to debate GOP foe Kari Lake. That, he said, violated the agreement KAET had with the Citizens Clean Elections Commission to deny such an opportunity to those who would not face their foes.

Lake was also given an opportunity for a 30-minute interview with Ted Simons, the host of the station’s public affairs program, but she refused after hearing that KAET was giving Hobbs an interview despite her refusal to debate.

What makes matters worse, the Senate president said, is that documents unearthed by the Arizona Republic found that ASU President Michael Crow had been involved at least indirectly with the decision to give airtime to Hobbs — without a debate requirement — at one point talking about the “election denier issue.” That refers to the fact that Lake was campaigning for governor on the false claim that Donald Trump beat Joe Biden in Arizona in the 2020 presidential race. Official results and several lawsuits confirmed Biden’s win.

And it also found that Mi-Ah Parrish, who had headed ASU’s media enterprise operations, told the head of the Clean Elections Commission that putting “a person on television with those views was wrong.”

All that, Petersen contends, is illegal.

In his letter to Carr, the Senate president, who also is running for attorney general, cited a 1998 U.S. Supreme Court ruling which said broadcasters “cannot grant or deny access to a candidate debate on the basis of whether it agrees with a candidate’s views,” with the court saying such viewpoint discrimination would present “an inevitability of skewing the electoral dialog.”

And, he said, that internal email showed that university officials were convinced that Hobbs would win, even after refusing to debate Lake.

In the end, Hobbs won by 17,116 votes out of nearly 2.6 million votes cast.

“Based on emails between top university officials, Arizona PBS made broadcast decisions based on how it viewed Kari Lake’s positions on election integrity and Katie Hobbs’ electoral prospects,” Petersen wrote.

“The FCC should investigate Arizona PBS’ blatant viewpoint discrimination against Kari Lake and partisan calculations designed to benefit Katie Hobbs,” he said. Petersen said he is seeking “appropriate enforcement action, including license revocation, to protect the public interest and ensure that Arizonans will not be subjected to biased media manipulation in the future.”

There was no immediate response from Scott Woelful, the station manager.

Whether there will be a repeat of all this in 2026 remains unclear. Hobbs has declined to say whether she will debate whoever survives the Republican primary race between Andy Biggs and Karrin Taylor Robson.