No DEI allowed for US mergers and acquisitions, says the new FCC chair

Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr said companies looking for regulatory approval should “get busy ending any sort of their invidious forms of DEI discrimination,” according to an interview with Bloomberg. Carr reportedly brought up Paramount’s merger with Skydance, Verizon’s purchase of Frontier Communications, and T-Mobile’s plans to acquire most of US Cellular as potential deals that could be affected.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, or DEI, has become a target of President Donald Trump’s administration, with various federal agencies ending diversity programs and pressuring major companies to do the same.

“We can only under the statute move forward and approve a transaction if we find that doing so serves the public interest,” Carr told Bloomberg. “If there’s businesses out there that are still promoting invidious forms of DEI discrimination, I really don’t see a path forward where the FCC could reach the conclusion that approving the transaction is going to be in the public interest.”

In February, Carr announced an investigation into the DEI-related initiatives at Comcast. He later sent a letter to Verizon to express concerns over its “apparent lack of progress” in ending DEI efforts, and asked the company’s executives to contact the FCC officials overseeing its acquisition of Frontier, as reported by Bloomberg.

Along with taking action against companies with DEI policies, Carr announced a “sweeping investigation” into the US operations of China-based companies previously placed on the FCC’s “Covered List,” such as Huawei, ZTE, and China Telecom.

The FCC will look into each company’s “current levels of operations” in the US, as Carr says the FCC has “reason to believe… some or all of these Covered List entities are trying to make an end run around those FCC prohibitions by continuing to do business in America on a private or ‘unregulated’ basis.”

Disclosure: Comcast is also an investor in Vox Media, The Verge’s parent company.