A Federal Appeals Court Said the Law Reserves Cheap TV Ads for Candidates. The Supreme Court Is Letting the Parties Keep Them Through Election Day.
Every election season, candidates for office get a break that ordinary advertisers do not. Federal law requires TV and radio stations to sell them airtime at the “lowest unit charge,” the cheapest rate the station gives any other customer. The point is to protect candidates from being priced out of reaching voters. Congress wrote that protection for “a legally qualified candidate.” This fall, the Supreme Court has twice used its emergency docket to keep it flowing to party committees, while a federal appeals court’s ruling that the law says otherwise sits on ice through the November 3 midterms. ...