Politics
Legal battle to halt Nexstar-Tegna TV station merger expands with five new states
California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta has enlisted new allies in his legal battle to unravel Nexstar Media Group’s takeover of rival television station group Tegna Inc.
Late Thursday, Bonta announced that five additional states have joined his coalition that is suing to block the $6.2-billion merger. With the additional plaintiffs, the group of top state law enforcement officers has grown to 13 — and the campaign now is a bipartisan effort.
“Antitrust enforcement is not political — it’s about protecting working families and helping ensure the benefits of a vibrant economy are for everyone, not just well-connected corporations,” Bonta said in a statement. “We welcome our sister states into the fray and look forward to fighting alongside them.”
The new states are Indiana, Kansas, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Vermont. They have joined existing the plaintiffs that represent the people of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Virginia.
Nexstar owns KTLA-TV Channel 5 in Los Angeles.
U.S. District Judge Troy Nunley two weeks ago granted a request by the attorneys general to issue a preliminary injunction halting the merger as the legal case proceeds. The proposed merger — which Nexstar rushed to complete despite opposition from the states — would create the nation’s largest broadcast station group with 265 television stations, up from 164 that Nexstar currently controls.
In dozens of markets, including San Diego and Sacramento, Nexstar would own multiple major TV network affiliates. That duplication has raised concerns about staff consolidations and widespread newsroom layoffs.
“State attorneys general nationwide understand just how important robust antitrust enforcement is to American life — and what a rotten deal this is for consumers, for workers, for affordability, and for our local news,” Bonta said.
El Segundo-based DirecTV separately filed a lawsuit to block the deal, saying the Nexstar-Tegna consolidation would harm their business by forcing DirecTV to pay significantly higher fees for the rights to carry their stations as part of its programming lineup.
A Nexstar representative was not immediately available for comment.
Nexstar contends the deal would strengthen TV station economics, allowing stations to bolster their news gathering and expand the number of newscasts. But DirecTV countered that in markets where Nexstar owns two stations, it relies on just one newsroom to program both channels.
Nexstar’s proposed purchase of Tegna would give the Irving, Texas-based Nexstar stations in 44 states covering 80% of the U.S. population.
The federal judge ruled there was sufficient merit in the antitrust arguments brought by Bonta and the others to pause Nexstar’s takeover of Tegna until a trial can be held to decide whether the merger is illegal.
“Nexstar must permit Tegna to continue operating as a separate and distinct, independently managed business unit from Nexstar,” Nunley wrote in his 52-page order on April 17. “And Nexstar must put measures in place to maintain Tegna as an ongoing, economically viable, and active competitor.”
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A Wyoming city councilman is facing backlash after posting a comment suggesting the state should “hang bad judges” in response to a court ruling on abortion, later insisting the remark was “not a threat.”
State Rep. Mike Yin, a Democrat, shared a post from Wyoming Public Radio & Media on Facebook regarding a Natrona County judge temporarily blocking the state’s six-week abortion ban, allowing abortions to resume while the law faces ongoing legal challenges.
“The legislature should obey the Constitution and the freedom to make your own healthcare choices. Instead we keep making it harder to keep doctors in Wyoming and kids in this state,” Yin wrote in the post. “The only way that changes is at the ballot box.”
Troy Bray, a city councilman in Powell, Wyoming, commented on the post about a judge blocking the state’s so-called “heartbeat” abortion law.
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“In order for Wyoming to find justice, we will have to hang bad judges,” Bray wrote.
The comment quickly drew criticism from other users, some of whom described the remark as dangerous and inappropriate given the role of elected officials.
Bray later addressed the backlash in a lengthy Facebook post, saying his comment was “a statement of my beliefs, NOT a threat,” and not intended as a call for others to act.
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Wyoming Republican Gov. Mark Gordon signed the fetal heartbeat abortion restriction in March, but he acknowledged the likelihood of legal challenges to come from it. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc/Getty Images)
“That is a statement of my beliefs, NOT a threat, as some have characterized it, nor is it a call for others to act,” Bray wrote.
Bray added that he is working to address what he sees as systemic issues “by any means necessary,” a phrase that has drawn additional scrutiny, though he said he intends to pursue peaceful solutions.
“I will exhaust every peaceful means I can find,” he wrote.
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Anti-abortion rights demonstrators march to the Supreme Court for the 52nd annual March for Life in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 24, 2025. (Bryan Dozier/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)
He also argued that Wyoming’s judicial system is “broken” and accused judges of overstepping their authority, writing that courts are often the “last place you will ever find justice.”
Bray expanded on that point in his follow-up post, arguing the legal system is often inaccessible to ordinary people.
“Lawyers file frivolous lawsuits intended to use the system as a punishment, financially draining their adversaries with a process that is formatted to require a specialist lawyer just to participate,” he wrote. “Show up without a lawyer, and you aren’t even allowed to present an argument. Justice is denied to anybody who doesn’t pay for it.”
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He also pointed to historical and international examples of public unrest, arguing that people will “fight” for justice when they believe it is being denied.
The comment came as legal battles over Wyoming’s abortion laws continue to play out in court.
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Bray, who serves on the Powell City Council, is one of several local officials who have weighed in publicly on the issue, which has drawn strong reactions from both supporters and opponents of abortion restrictions.
Fox News Digital reached out to Bray for additional comment but did not immediately receive a response.
The Justice Department on Thursday accused the Biden administration of pushing policies that were unfair to Christians, releasing a report that amounted to the latest rhetorical broadside by the Trump administration over what it calls the “weaponization” of government.
The 197-page document, released by a task force led by the department, sought to portray what President Trump’s advisers contend was anti-Christian bias among those who worked for President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who is Roman Catholic. The report, which refers to decision-making at more than a dozen agencies, comes weeks after Mr. Trump publicly attacked the pope.
“The Biden administration’s policies regularly clashed with a Christian worldview and burdened traditional religious practices,” the report said. “These conflicts frequently arose over abortion, gender ideology, and sexual orientation.”
The document is the Justice Department’s latest effort to argue that it is removing purported political bias from the work of prosecutors. But critics say that the department under Mr. Trump has abandoned its tradition of operating independently from the White House, including by pursuing the president’s rivals, like James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, who was indicted this week for posting a photograph last year of seashells on a beach arranged to say “86 47.” The administration argues that the image was a coded threat to kill the president.
Earlier this month, the Justice Department issued a report accusing Biden-era prosecutors of unfairly pursuing anti-abortion activists through the use of a law that makes it a crime to obstruct or intimidate a person seeking abortion services or participating in a religious service at a house of worship. The Trump administration, in turn, has charged dozens of protesters, as well as the former CNN anchor Don Lemon, with violating the same law during a demonstration inside a church in St. Paul, Minn.
In a statement accompanying the release of Thursday’s report, Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, vowed that the department would “continue to expose bad actors who targeted Christians, and work tirelessly to restore religious liberty for all Americans of faith.”
The report sharply criticized a leaked internal memo from 2023 by the F.B.I.’s field office in Richmond, Va., that said far-right extremists could be attracted to Catholic churches or groups.
For decades, the F.B.I. has worked to develop sources at churches, universities and mosques, but the Richmond memo quickly became a talking point on the right. Republicans argued that it showed the bureau was targeting Catholics.
F.B.I. officials quickly withdrew the memo after it was leaked, and an internal investigation found no evidence of “malicious intent.” But the new report argues otherwise. The memo, the report asserts, stemmed from a “misplaced reliance on baseless allegations from the Southern Poverty Law Center and the religious affiliation of a single law enforcement target who happened to identify himself as a ‘radical traditional Catholic.’”
Earlier this month, the Justice Department charged the S.P.L.C. with fraud, accusing the group of paying informants inside hate groups not to fight racism and extremism, but to promote them. The group has denied the charges and called it a politically motivated prosecution.
The new report also criticized a memo issued in 2021 by Attorney General Merrick B. Garland in response to concerns raised by the National School Boards Association about purported threats to local education officials, as parents and teachers grappled with restrictions enacted during the coronavirus pandemic.
Mr. Garland’s memo ordered the creation of a task force of Justice Department prosecutors and F.B.I. investigators to use their “authority and resources to discourage these threats.”
That directive, however, raised significant internal concerns at the F.B.I. and Justice Department. One senior prosecutor warned that “the vast, vast majority of the behavior cited” by the National School Boards Association did not violate federal law.
“Almost all of the language being used is protected by the First Amendment,” the Justice Department lawyer warned shortly before the Garland memo was issued.
While the Trump administration report cites the Garland memo as an example of anti-Christian bias, the document leaves unclear how school board fights over masks, remote learning and safety in public schools constitute a religious issue.
Politics
House Republicans splinter over pesticide provision in farm bill as MAHA movement flexes its muscle
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A bipartisan group of House lawmakers moved Thursday to strip out a controversial pesticide provision from legislation setting U.S. farm and nutrition policy after Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., threatened to “slaughter” the legislation if her measure did not receive a floor vote.
Lawmakers voted 280 to 142 to approve Luna’s amendment, which removed language from the farm bill shielding pesticide manufacturers from legal liability.
The successful vote could be a sign of the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement’s growing influence over congressional Republicans, who splintered over the issue. Leading MAHA advocates applied public pressure on Republicans to back the amendment, arguing that failing to do so would be a betrayal of the MAHA movement.
Seventy-three Republicans backed Luna’s measure, while 142 GOP lawmakers rejected it.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, a Republican from Florida, speaks to members of the media outside a House Republican Conference meeting at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 3, 2025. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg)
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The provision that lawmakers struck would block lawsuits against pesticide companies for failing to disclose potential health risks as long as they are in compliance with Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations on labeling. States and localities would be barred from issuing pesticide labeling guidance that diverges from the EPA.
“I have a little boy, and the amount of articles I have seen on pesticides and herbicides popping up in children’s products (to include organic) is very bad,” Luna, a MAHA-aligned Republican, wrote on social media earlier this week. “On behalf of all the moms and dads that aren’t in office, I am not going to be bullied into supporting a bill that is providing protections and immunity to corporations that are responsible for giving children and adults cancer.”
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, policy chair of the House Freedom Caucus, also endorsed Luna’s amendment, arguing it would “protect Americans from dangerous pesticides.”
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, speaks to reporters after a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 20, 2025, during a government shutdown. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
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Republican critics, however, contended that Luna’s amendment would raise costs for consumers if the pesticide provision was stripped from the farm bill.
“If the EPA says the label is good, I don’t see why every state municipality should have to have another label that would simply raise the price for the American consumer,” Rep. Austin Scott, R-Ga., said in opposition to Luna’s measure.
“We’re not talking about the pesticide in the jug as has been misrepresented to the American citizens and especially the MAHA movement,” Scott continued. “We’re talking about just the label on the jug. There is no liability shield for the pesticide in the jug.
A farmworker wearing protective gear sprays pesticide in a field. (Andrew Holbrooke/Corbis via Getty Images)
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., also sharply criticized Luna’s measure.
“The arguments on the other side are pretty shallow, and they’re emotional,” Thompson said on the House floor. “They’re not science-based.”
Democrats also widely backed the effort to remove the pesticide provision from the bill.
“Put simply, this language puts chemical company profits over the health of Americans,” Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, said during debate on the House floor.
A woman holds a bottle of the weedkiller Roundup containing glyphosate in her garden in a staged scene. (Wolf von Dewitz/Picture Alliance)
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The floor battle over the pesticide provision also comes as the Supreme Court heard oral arguments this week about whether pesticide manufacturers like Bayer, which acquired Monsanto in 2018, should be given legal preemption from failing to warn consumers that its weedkiller product Roundup could cause cancer.
The Trump administration sparked controversy among MAHA advocates earlier this year when it declared domestic production of glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup, a national security priority. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an influential MAHA voice, publicly defended the move despite railing against glyphosate for years.
Bayer has repeatedly maintained that its product is safe to use and has not been found to cause cancer.
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