We live in a hyper-partisan, sharply divided, deeply polarized nation, where compromise is very infrequently reached. It is near impossible to find an issue that the far Left and the far Right agree on, one that heavily impacts the realms of media, politics, technology and the climate. Yet the decision by several car manufacturers to remove AM radio from their new vehicles is just such an issue.
BMW, Volkswagen, Mazda, and Tesla have indicated they will remove AM radio from their new electric cars, because electric engines can interfere with reception of AM station signals. Ford actually announced it's going to remove AM radio from all of its new cars, whether electric or gas.
This is a huge issue for the over 4,000 AM radio stations around the country. It is also a huge issue for conservative talk radio, which exists all over the AM dial, as well as a multitude of Spanish language format radio stations and many other foreign language ethnic formats, plus religious radio stations.
This is a disaster for the oldest form of broadcasting in the United States. It would deprive AM radio of its auto listenership, and could deliver a death blow.
Consider that half of AM radio's audience comes from people listening from their cars. About 40 percent of AM radio stations have formats that are either news, talk, or local sports. Another 20 percent of stations are oriented toward specific ethnic and religious groups. About a third of AM broadcasters have music formats geared toward Spanish audiences or less popular genres like gospel music. And a lot of agricultural reports are provided via AM radio in certain parts of the country.
Put together, 82 million Americans still listen to AM stations every month, according to the National Association of Broadcasters. This is a monumental issue, and one that unites the Right and Left.
A number of radio stations with Black or Spanish speaking audiences are airing messages for their listeners to call and write Congress to require AM radio station reception in all new cars. And they've recruited to the cause an unlikely couple: the very liberal U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, Ed Markey, and very conservative U.S. Senator from Texas, Ted Cruz. Cruz and Markey each enlisted colleagues from both sides of the aisle to introduce legislation which would require car manufacturers to keep AM radio as a built-in part of car audio systems.
Naturally, the two Senators have different rationales for joining forces in their effort. Senator Markey echoes the National Association of Broadcasters claim that AM radio is "the backbone of the nation's emergency alert system," while Senator Cruz's basis for sponsoring the legislation is his support of conservative talk radio. "I think there's a reason big car companies were open to taking down AM radio, which is AM radio is where a lot of talk radio is found, and talk radio is overwhelmingly conservative," Cruz told the Houston Chronicle. "And let's be clear: big business doesn't like things that are overwhelmingly conservative."
Their efforts are succeeding: A number of companies have told the senators they do not plan to remove AM radio, including Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru, Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, and Jaguar Land Rover. Interestingly, GM has not committed on AM one way or the other.
As a former counsel to the House Telecommunication Subcommittee where I often thought the regulatory policies that AM broadcasters asked Congress to pursue made them media luddites, the fact that the political Left and Right are in agreement on this issue goes a long way to convincing me that preserving AM radio in automobiles is the right thing to do. If we can figure out autonomous driving, we can figure out how to keep electric motors from interfering with AM radio signals.
Elon, take a few precious minutes away from Twitter and figure this out.
Tom Rogers is an editor-at-large for Newsweek, the founder of CNBC and a CNBC contributor. He also established MSNBC, is the former CEO of TiVo, and a member of Keep Our Republic, an organization dedicated to preserving the nation's democracy.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
