Affiliate issues
Some Time Warner Cable subscribers around the country were unable to watch CW programming when the network debuted, as stations in several markets were not able to reach carriage deals with the provider to distribute the local affiliates. In markets such as Charleston, South Carolina; El Paso, Texas; Honolulu, Hawaii; Palm Springs, California; Beaumont; Waco and Corpus Christi, Texas, where the CW is broadcast on a digital subchannel of one of the market's major network affiliates, there were unsuccessful attempts in getting Time Warner Cable to carry the subchannel affiliates (CW then-co-parent Time Warner had owned Time Warner Cable until it spun off the provider into a separate company in 2009; TWC was later acquired by Charter Communications in 2016).
Some affiliates eventually signed carriage deals with Time Warner Cable, but not all of the CW affiliates received carriage on the provider's basic cable tiers (for example, Syracuse, New York affiliate WSTQ-LP could only be viewed on digital cable channel 266 in the Ithaca market). The largest market without a known affiliate is the Johnstown–Altoona market, whose closest CW station was CBS-owned WPCW (now WPKD-TV, an independent station) in Pittsburgh, which is carried on Charter's Johnstown and Altoona area systems; WPKD-TV was originally targeted to serve that area before it refocused its programming toward the Pittsburgh market in the late 1990s.
On February 2, 2007, Beaumont, Texas CBS station KFDM made its CW-affiliated subchannel available to Time Warner Cable customers in the market on channel 10. On April 20, 2007, ABC affiliate KVIA-TV in El Paso, Texas began broadcasting its CW-affiliated subchannel on Time Warner Cable channel 13. On April 21, 2007, KCWQ-LP made its broadcast debut on channel 5 on Time Warner Cable in the Palm Springs area.
One of the network's major affiliate groups, Pappas Telecasting Companies, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for thirteen of its television stations on May 10, 2008. Within the petition, Pappas specifically cited the network's low ratings and lackluster performance as one of many complications that had forced it to make the filing. Several of the stations have since been sold either in business transactions with representatives involved in Pappas's bankruptcy proceedings or via station auction processes as the company winds down operations.
Although Pappas had originally stated that none of its stations would be affected at all by the closing, two stations owned by the company that were formerly affiliated with the CW have ceased operations. On May 29, 2008, Yakima, Washington affiliate KCWK (which served the south-central portion of that state) shut down and the station's offices were closed, leaving that area without locally based CW programming and forcing pay television providers to carry Los Angeles affiliate KTLA in order to provide the network's programming to their subscribers. The situation was resolved in April 2009, when Fisher Communications announced that its CBS affiliates in the area, KIMA-TV and satellite station KEPR-TV, would carry the network through DTT subchannel affiliations.
Subsequently, WLGA in Columbus, Georgia lost its CW affiliation in April 2009 to a subchannel of NBC affiliate WLTZ because of the network's concerns about Pappas' financial state; WLGA ultimately ceased operations in June 2010 as it was unable to compete in the market as an independent station.
While Tribune Media had solid affiliation deals with the CW on several of its stations, it also maintained a strong affiliation alliance with Fox. But with new management and ownership taking over Tribune in 2008, it was apparent that the company would switch one of its CW-affiliated stations to Fox (at least those in markets without a Fox owned-and-operated station or a former O&O that was acquired by Local TV, which Tribune later acquired in 2013), adding to more questions surrounding the CW's future. In a March 2008 seminar by Tribune's then-chairman and CEO Sam Zell, it was revealed that the company's San Diego outlet KSWB-TV would switch its affiliation from the CW to Fox that August, with KSWB assuming the Fox affiliation from XETV-TV, which had been a Fox charter affiliate since that network's October 1986 inception. XETV (which is licensed to Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico under the ownership of Grupo Televisa but whose U.S. operations are programmed by Bay City Television) was not informed of Zell's deal until it was made public.
After the news broke, XETV planned on suing to prevent the switch because it would violate an affiliation contract that XETV had with Fox that was not set to expire until 2010. However, on July 2, 2008, XETV announced that it would join the CW on August 1 (the same day that KSWB became a Fox affiliate) and rebrand as "San Diego 6". Though twelve of Tribune's thirteen other CW-affiliated stations have remained with the network, all of them began to de-emphasize the network from their branding (e.g., "CW 11") in favor of one with a stronger local identity. On-air branding that excised the CW name began being implemented by the stations in July 2008, either on-air (in the case of KWGN-TV) or through their websites (as part of a redesign for all of the Tribune stations' websites). Some of these stations eventually began reincorporating the CW branding starting in 2011, such as KDAF/Dallas, KIAH/Houston and KRCW-TV/Portland, Oregon.
Tribune Company president and CEO Peter Liguori said in a May 2014 discussion at the MoffettNathanson Media & Communications Summit that he was "not pleased with where the CW is [in regards to its ratings performance]", stating that the network "should not program to [young] people who don't watch [conventional] television". Liguori also stated that he would consider collaborating with the network in regards to improving its programming slate, possibly by incorporating programs from the company's Tribune Studios unit (a production division which launched shortly after Liguori was appointed president of Tribune in November 2013) onto the network, as well as having Tribune play a larger role in the CW's management.
Speaking at Goldman Sachs' 23rd Annual Communacopia Conference in September 2014, Les Moonves acknowledged that Tribune had been looking for more input in how the network is programmed and noted that Liguori is a former programmer (having previously served in executive roles at Fox, FX and Discovery Communications), saying that "[Liguori] would like to participate. He has some good ideas. He's part of our team. Will there be some change in how the CW is structured going forward? I don't know." Moonves went on to reiterate that Tribune is "a very important part of [CBS'] future" (considering that Tribune had recently acquired the CBS affiliation for its Indianapolis station and then-CW affiliate WTTV, following disagreements between CBS and longtime affiliate WISH-TV, which would eventually take over the CW affiliation in January 2015, over reverse compensation demands by the network).
In an October 2014 interview with Broadcasting & Cable, Liguori appeared to reverse course on his previous statements and spoke of Tribune's support of the network. Liguori said in a statement, "We are very encouraged by the recent uptick in the CW['s] ratings and the positive critical response to the new primetime lineup. In particular, [CW CEO Mark Pedowitz] has put in place a programming strategy that will help the network appeal to a wider, more inclusive audience, which is important for our stations across the country. We were glad to support the launch of the new shows through editorial and promotional initiatives, and we look forward to more continued collaboration to build upon this momentum."
In January 2016, the CW and Tribune began negotiations on a new affiliation deal, as the original 10-year agreement signed at the network's inception was approaching its end. Complicating matters was the desire by the CW's then-parent companies, CBS and Warner Bros., to stream the network's programming as a standalone pay OTT service. The impasse in negotiations resulted in a months-long standoff between the two groups.
On May 23, 2016, the CW and Tribune announced they had come to a new affiliation agreement. As part of the deal, Tribune's Chicago flagship WGN-TV would leave the network and revert to being an independent station after nearly 21 years of being affiliated with the CW and its predecessor network, the WB. A major factor in this decision was WGN-TV's large use of local sports programming at the time, which led to many pre-emptions of the CW while WGN-TV had to move as many as 30 games a year to another local station in Chicago. The CW affiliation moved to WPWR-TV, a Fox Television Stations-owned MyNetworkTV station. On September 19, 2019, Tribune Media was acquired by Nexstar Media Group.
Roberts Broadcasting filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on October 7, 2011; the company cited the loss of the UPN affiliations on its stations in St. Louis (WRBU), Columbia, South Carolina (WZRB) and Jackson, Mississippi (WRBJ-TV) when that network shut down in favor of the CW in 2006, as much of UPN's programming consisted of minority-targeted programs that Roberts felt were compatible with their stations' target audiences (though the stations have since recovered from this setback; additionally, its station in Evansville, Indiana, WAZE-TV, had instead affiliated with the WB prior to 2006, as it was owned by South Central Communications until February 2007). The company had also been hit with lawsuits from Warner Bros. Television, Twentieth Television and CBS Television Distribution over its failure to pay fees for syndicated programming; Roberts eventually settled with Twentieth but lost the Warner Bros. and CBS cases.
On March 24, 2011, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) canceled WAZE's license for Roberts' failure to construct its digital transmitter facilities. However, the station continued to broadcast via its three-station analog translator network.
On February 20, 2012, Roberts Broadcasting announced that it was exploring the possibility of selling one or all four of its television stations in order to raise enough cash to pay off its creditors. On October 22, 2012, Roberts announced that it had sold WRBJ to the Trinity Broadcasting Network; the deal was approved by a bankruptcy court on January 17, 2013, with TBN officially taking over operational control of WRBJ five months later on May 24 The CW returned to the Jackson market on the second digital subchannel of CBS affiliate WJTV in September 2013. On January 3, 2013, the repeater network of WAZE ceased operations; later that month on January 28, independent station WTVW hurriedly joined the CW, in order to maintain the network in the Evansville area.
On December 2, 2013, Roberts filed to sell WZRB to Radiant Light Ministries, a subsidiary of Tri-State Christian Television, for $2 million. On December 4, Roberts also filed to sell WRBU to TCT for $5.5 million. However, on December 11, the United States bankruptcy court gave initial approval for a plan by Roberts's creditors to instead transfer WRBU, WZRB and the WAZE repeaters to a trust with Ion Media Networks (a creditor in Roberts's chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings) as its beneficiary, with Roberts' attorney subsequently stating that Ion would purchase the stations for $7.75 million. Roberts had earlier proposed an alternate plan that would have had only the WAZE repeaters be transferred to the trust, which would have allowed the sale of WRBU and WZRB to TCT. The CW affiliation in Columbia moved to WKTC (with MyNetworkTV, which the station had already been affiliated with, being relegated to a secondary affiliation) in March 2014, after temporarily remaining on WZRB after its conversion into an Ion Television O&O the previous month. Ion Media later chose to wind down the ex-WAZE-TV translator network entirely and instead affiliate with Nexstar's WTVW-DT4 (itself a CW affiliate on its main channel) by 2017.
In July 2023, Nexstar implemented a blackout of the CW, along with its affiliates for other major broadcast networks, on DirecTV, DirecTV Stream, and U-verse TV, causing DirecTV to complain to the FCC. In return, Nexstar stated that their streaming agreement with DirecTV had expired in November 2022 and it was illegally streaming content on DirecTV Stream from the CW. In August 2023, Nexstar reached a renewal agreement with Sinclair Broadcast Group for 35 markets, including restoring broadcasting of the CW on DirecTV Stream in 21 markets. Nexstar and DirecTV signed a new multi-year agreement on September 17, 2023, allowing the latter to resume broadcasting and streaming the CW.
As part of the sale to Nexstar, Paramount Global's CBS News and Stations subsidiary was granted the right to withdraw its eight affiliates from the network—in Atlanta, Detroit, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Sacramento, San Francisco, Seattle and the Tampa Bay area—which was exercised on May 5, 2023, effective September 1, 2023. In some of the affected markets, Nexstar-owned stations were announced as replacements. The remainder of the affected markets were addressed through new affiliation agreements with group owners Hearst Television, Gray Television, The E.W. Scripps Company and Sinclair Broadcast Group, each of which already owned multiple CW affiliates. Nexstar also began reclaiming the network affiliation in other markets where it operated, including Oklahoma City; Billings, Montana; Grand Rapids, Michigan; Panama City, Florida; and Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
The situation of the CW in the Detroit market after the CBS withdrawal was tenuous for several months. Mission Broadcasting, a company that contracts with Nexstar for the operational services of its stations, agreed to purchase WADL from Adell Broadcasting Corporation in a deal that provided for Nexstar to supply many of its operating functions. In addition, WADL became the new CW affiliate in Detroit while the deal was pending. The acquisition stalled at the FCC over objections concerning the relationship between Mission and Nexstar. As a result, Adell Broadcasting removed CW programming from the station on October 30, 2023; the network's programs reappeared on Scripps-owned WMYD on November 13, 2023. The acquisition of WADL by Mission was called off in May 2024, despite the purchase being approved by the FCC a month prior.
On April 19, 2024, Nexstar announced that the CW would not renew its affiliations with the seven E.W. Scripps Company-owned stations—in Norfolk, Lafayette, Detroit, Miami, Tucson, Corpus Christi, and San Luis Obispo—that still carried the network. Nexstar concurrently announced that the CW would move to its own stations in Norfolk and Lafayette effective September 1, 2024; the move would also end WMYD's brief affiliation with the network. On May 1, 2024, it was announced that the CW would move back to its original Chicago station affiliate, WGN-TV (Channel 9), beginning September 1, 2024.
On January 10, 2025, Nexstar implemented a blackout of 63 of its local stations and NewsNation on Optimum, with the CW's flagship station WPIX being a major part of the dispute. Nexstar accused Optimum's owner Altice USA of making irrational demands for special terms during contract negotiations, while Altice in return accused it of demanding excessive rates for its programming and forcing it to carry unpopular channels like NewsNation. The two reached a carriage agreement on January 18, allowing Nexstar programming to be restored on Optimum.
