The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission hit back Thursday after being denounced over the independent agency’s decision to crack down on an Austin, Texas, pirate radio station that used to broadcast controversial conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ show.
“Some have criticized the FCC for removing Mr. Jones from the airwaves in Austin allegedly because of the content of his program. Many others have praised us for allegedly taking that same action,” Chairman Ajit Pai said Thursday during a Senate Commerce Committee hearing.
“It is important to make clear that our pirate radio enforcement, including this one, has nothing to do with the content that pirate radio stations air,” he continued. “We act against pirate radio stations because they are violating the law by broadcasting on the FM airwaves without a license.”
The FCC sued Liberty Radio in a Texas federal district court on Friday to collect a $15,000 fine it imposed in 2014 after the station continued operating using 90.1 FM without federal consent. Liberty Radio has thus far refused to pay the penalty.
“Indeed in this case, the operators of the FM stations received a warning from the FCC that they were broadcasting without a license, yet refused to come into compliance with the law,” Pai added. “We will always follow the law.”
Liberty Radio’s website, txlr.net, states that the station had not been broadcast over the airwaves since December, but was still streaming online and available over the phone.
Content from Jones and his far-right Infowars website were removed from most major social media and online platforms last week, including Facebook, Apple, and YouTube, following violations of their hate speech policies. Twitter on Tuesday slapped him with a seven-day suspension for similarly infringing its code of conduct.
[Twitter CEO: Alex Jones should think about his actions during his ‘timeout’]
