NBC Stations Post Equal Time Notice About Donald Trump's 'SNL' Gig

[mvcg66b3r]

NBC stations have begun filing the legally required notice about Donald Trump’s broadcast time on “Saturday Night Live,” noting that it lasted 12 minutes and five seconds.

“Donald Trump, a candidate for the Republican nomination for President in the 2016 national election, appeared without charge on NBC’s ‘Saturday Night Live’ for a total period of 12:05 (12 minutes and 5 seconds) commencing at 11:39:11 PM ET on Nov. 7 and ending at 1:01:01AM ET on Nov. 8, 2015,” read a notice filed by NBC’s New York affiliate, WNBC TV.

This triggers a seven-day window in which rival candidates can request equal time. They still have to show that they are bona fide candidates within the state in which “Saturday Night Live” was broadcast, and NBC doesn’t necessarily have to give them time within the same program.

http://variety.com/2015/tv/news/donald-trump-saturday-night-live-equal-time-nbc-1201636405/

 

[umfan]

I wonder if each station will be consistent about this. I suspect the network provided guidance to this effect. They should've anyway.

 

[vchimpanzee]

They could have done "SNL" without putting so much emphasis on politics. Trump did do a couple of sketches where he played other characters, and he did a good enough job with those characters. But when he spent that much time playing himself AND talking politics, then the other candidates have a case.

 

[frankberry]

It doesn't matter what Donald Trump was doing on SNL. He could have spent 12:05 reading Mother Goose. Other candidates are entitled to equal on-air time.

 

[blizzard59]

As a follow-up to this thread, in case anybody was wondering, four Republican candidates ended up getting equal time on NBC stations: Jim Gilmore, Lindsey Graham, Mike Huckabee, and John Kasich. NBC allowed each to air a 30-second campaign ad a grand total of 24 times over the course of prime time on November 27th and 28th and the SNL rerun on the 28th. Only NBC stations viewable in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina were obligated to air the ads, since equal time requests are done at the local station level, and those were the only states the candidates specifically requested their ads air in.

From a technical point of view, NBC handled everything for the local stations by providing two feeds of prime time programming on the 27th and 28th and two feeds of the SNL rerun on the 28th. More specifically, for the equal time requests, they used the Central Time Zone feed, which would otherwise be redundant with respect to the Eastern Time Zone feed during prime time and late night. Programming was the same on both feeds, but the ads were different, and the two feeds weren't necessarily always in sync due to different timings of the ads, promos, and local breaks.

 

[vchimpanzee]

I taped SNL over the weekend and fast-forwarded through a large number of spots for these candidates. I didn't have time to watch them but was planning to do it later. If I haven't lost the SNL episode, maybe I should go back and watch tonight because I'd be interested in seeing what was said. I used to listen to two of Mike Huckabee's three daily radio commentaries each day.

 

[FreddyE1977]

It doesn't matter what Donald Trump was doing on SNL. He could have spent 12:05 reading Mother Goose. Other candidates are entitled to equal on-air time.

Perhaps all that is telling us is that the Equal Time Rule is arcane and needs to be updated. Certainly it is impractical to ask stations to comply when you have up to 14 candidates running. And pointless when you consider that an incumbent President can take to the airwaves as often as he/she wants without being subject to it's provisions.

Besides I think Trump is making all of his headway using social media, not broadcast TV.