FCC Chairman Responds With Parks and Recs Meme to Critic Calling Him a ‘Whole Bitch’

Brendan Carr, the Trump-appointed chairman of the FCC, has not directly weighed in on the backlash over the agency’s move to force Disney’s ABC to reapply for spectrum licenses on an accelerated schedule — a move that comes as President Trump has called for Jimmy Kimmel to be fired over a joke the late-night host made about First Lady Melania Trump.

But on Wednesday evening, Carr did post a riposte to a commenter on X who took aim at the FCC chief. a A user named Brian Christopher tagged Carr in a post that said “This dude @BrendanCarrFCC is a whole bitch. Can’t wait till the next president replaces his goofy ass.”

To that, Carr responded with a meme drawn from NBC’s “Parks and Recreation,” quoting a line delivered by Ron Swanson (played by Nick Offerman): “Never half-ass two things. Whole-ass one thing.”

It was not an atypical response from Carr, who, like others in the MAGA-verse, fire back at critics using memes meant to convey bravado and defiance.

Officially, the FCC’s Media Bureau, in its April 28 order, said it was calling in ABC’s licenses for eight owned-and-operated stations for early review pursuant to an investigation into Disney and ABC over potential violations of the FCC’s “prohibition on unlawful discrimination” — in other words, the agency is reviewing ABC’s licenses as part of its probe into the company’s diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices.

But the timing of the order clearly left the impression that the FCC was acting in response to outrage expressed by Trump and others over Kimmel’s comedy bit in which he said Melania had the “glow of an expectant widow.” That came two days before the actual White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 25 was thrown into chaos after an armed man charged through a security perimeter outside the ballroom before he was apprehended and subsequently charged with an assassination attempt on the president.

The optics of the situation — in which it seems as if the FCC is attempting to punish or intimidate ABC over Kimmel’s joke — drew condemnation from advocacy groups and lawmakers.

Among those criticizing the agency’s move was Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. “It is not government’s job to censor speech, and I do not believe the FCC should operate as the speech police,” Cruz said about the accelerated license review of the ABC-owned stations.

In response to Cruz’s criticism, an FCC spokesperson said, “As the agency decision makes clear, the early renewal order is based on a long-running FCC investigation into Disney’s DEI conduct, not any speech.”