Donald Trump announced today that he’s running for attention once again, and NBC suggested the network will stick with The Celebrity Apprentice even if Trump isn’t involved. You may recall that we’ve been through this before.
Full orange-faced as usual, Trump announced he’s running for president as a Republican, saying, “We are going to make our country great again,” as if a country where he can have a hit network TV show and pretend to run for president occasionally isn’t a great country.
In a statement released to the media, NBC said, “We will re-evaluate Trump’s role as host of Celebrity Apprentice should it become necessary, as we are committed to this franchise.” They have said this before.
There is a potentially serious issue: Broadcast networks are required to provide equal time for candidates in non-news programming. So, if NBC was going to air The Celebrity Apprentice next spring and Trump was still pretending to run, they’d have to give equal time to all the other presidential candidates.
Or, they could replace him, which is what it sounds like they would do. It’s a good idea anyway; I think Ivanka should take over the franchise.