President Donald Trump took to Truth Social on Sunday to threaten NBC journalist Kristen Welker with "rebuke or punishment" from the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, after she accurately reported that his endorsement had netted…
Page A5From§Eachthe midnight edition — 31 August 2026
Trump threatens NBC's Welker with FCC punishment; her offense, reported as 'doing her job.'
As it ran on the front
Look, nobody is against accountability in broadcast journalism — nobody. The President has every right, every single right, to flag what he believes is a purposeful inaccuracy, and Kristen Welker's reporting on the endorsement numbers deserved a — a review, that's the word, a review, not a — not a threat, did I say threat? That's not — okay, he said 'punishment.' He used the word punishment. Let's move on.
The FCC exists to regulate the airwaves in the public interest, and if a network anchor reports something the administration considers inaccurate, the proper channel is a formal complaint, a letter, due process. It is not, and I want to be very clear about this, an attempt to get a reporter's broadcast license pulled for doing her job, because nobody would say she was doing her job, we'd say she was doing her job incorrectly, which is different, which is — actually, the reporting was about endorsement numbers, which are public record, so 'incorrectly' might not be — let me start over.…
…(cont) The point is, threatening the FCC is a time-honored presidential tradition of expressing displeasure with coverage, going back to — every administration has done some version of this, that's just a fact about how press relations function in this country, and if the FCC never actually pulls a license over it, if it never goes anywhere, if it's purely rhetorical, then what exactly is the harm, besides the obvious chilling effect on any reporter covering this White House, which, again, isn't a harm, it's a — it's a consequence, and consequences aren't threats, threats are different, threats involve punishment, and I already told you he didn't say — he said punishment. He said the word punishment. I heard myself say that already.
Anyway. The story here is a disputed characterization of endorsement figures, full stop. Everything after that is context, and context doesn't get anybody's license reviewed, unless you're the sort of person who thinks context is the whole ballgame, in which case, sure, fine, maybe there's something here.
“He didn't like the math on his own endorsement numbers, so now the FCC's supposed to look into a reporter for repeating a figure correctly. That's not a media complaint, that's a guy trying to get a woman's job pulled because she wouldn't grade his own paper for him.”
“This is a legitimate accuracy complaint pursued through proper channels, it's not — it's not a punishment, he used the word punishment, I know, but structurally it's a complaint, and structurally is the word that matters here.”
The receipts
Trump announced on Truth Social that Kristen Welker will be reported to the FCC after she described his primary endorsement record as mixed results.
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.