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 After ABC's Academy Awards coverage ended Sunday, its Eugene affiliate spent the first three minutes of its newscast on Dancer's candidacy, including a question-and-answer session with an on-air colleague.
Quite a bit of high-profile coverage for a second-tier state race. Which brings up a question: What about Dancer's four Democratic rivals?
"I was stunned that this man who was in my living room every night announced his candidacy on the evening news," said one of those candidates, state Sen. Vicki Walker. "It just didn't seem like something you could do."
The station's CEO, Carolyn Chambers, is a staunch Republican who has given nearly $90,000 to Republican causes and candidates over the last 13 years.
Chambers did not return a call from The Associated Press.
Her son, Scott Chambers, the president of Chambers Communications, said the decision to allow Dancer to announce his candidacy on air had nothing to do with his mother's politics.
"The decision was arrived at based on the length of time Rick had been on our air," he said. "After 20 years in the market, with the popularity that research has shown that he had, we needed a public way to tell the viewer where he went."
Dancer would have been given the same opportunity had he been running as a Democrat, Scott Chambers said.
It's not uncommon for media figures to enter politics, but the way KEZI handled the transition is unusual, said Kelly McBride, ethics group leader at the nonprofit Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla.
"The standard practice is that the person resigns or takes a leave of absence at least a couple of days before they make their announcement independently from the station," she said.
"The problem is that the news staff, the people who are supposed to be providing fair, distanced, clear-eyed coverage of political campaigns, apparently have been co-opted into one of their own staff members' campaigns," McBride said.
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 Dancer did not immediately return two calls seeking comment from The Associated Press.
He told The Register-Guard newspaper of Eugene for a story in Thursday's edition that his decision and subsequent departure from KEZI was, "a big story, because, number one, it's the first Republican out (in the race). Number two, it's a pretty well-known guy in this community."
Under Federal Communications Commission rules, broadcast stations must provide equal air time opportunities to political opponents, particularly for commercial ad space. But the rules do grant exceptions, including one that applies to news interviews and scheduled newscasts. And potential violations are only investigated if someone files a complaint.
Walker said she had not ruled out filing a complaint with the FCC.
Reached on Thursday, two of the Democrats running for secretary of state, state Sen. Rick Metsger and former Senate Majority Leader Kate Brown, declined to comment on the matter, saying they were focused on the primary. A third, state Sen. Brad Avakian, did not immediately return a call from The AP.
McBride, from the Poynter Institute, said that in many cases, when a reporter or a news anchor runs for office, "there is normally a plan in place to ensure fairness to all the candidates in that particular race. Sometimes that includes hiring a freelancer or extra levels of editing."
Scott Chambers said those were steps his newsroom might consider.
[Associated
Press]
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