Gunfight at the AM Corral

AM radio's last stand is happening right now — in your car

There’s a bill moving through Congress that could determine whether AM radio survives the next decade. And there’s a station in Los Angeles whose numbers may be telling us whether that even matters anymore.

The AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act has been kicking around Capitol Hill for three years — introduced, stalled, reintroduced, stalled again. Last month, the House Energy and Commerce Committee folded its language into the pending surface transportation reauthorization bill, which improves its odds of becoming law this year. The NAB called it essential for public safety. The Consumer Technology Association called it a cost-raising innovation killer. Place your bets.

The emergency broadcasting argument is the strongest card AM’s supporters hold. When Superstorm Sandy hit the East Coast, people didn’t reach for apps; they reached for AM radio. During the L.A. wildfires, the same story. There’s something about a 50,000-watt clear-channel signal that cuts through when cell towers go dark and streaming buffers.

But when your ratings argument gets wobbly, you lean on public safety.

Here’s Exhibit A: KNX.

On May 11th, KNX News moved back to solely being heard on the 1070 AM signal, surrendering the 97.1 FM simulcast it had held since December 2021. That FM signal now carries sports. KNX goes back to being what it was for a century — an AM station.

I worked there. It was a big deal for us when that FM signal went live. Yes, AM has reach, but FM has relevance, and these days, relevance is more important. KNX picked up a lot of listeners who didn’t care about AM or didn’t like it because of the sound quality.

But I also know what an AM signal can do. On a clear night, 1070 reaches half the continent. In Los Angeles traffic, it’s the station on a million presets. But presets are set by people who remember setting them. The question is whether anyone new is setting them.

Even in cars that still have AM radio, the AM dial is an afterthought. And that’s even if someone takes the time to bypass the CarPlay or Android Auto app and go directly to the car’s audio settings.

In April — its final full month simulcasting on both AM and FM — KNX held a 4.1 share. In May, that number dropped to 3.5. That’s a 15 percent decline, measured over a survey period that captured only nine days of the new reality. Nine days isn't enough to call a trend, but it's enough to make you nervous.

Now zoom out. Who is actually listening to AM radio in cars in 2026?

The honest answer is: older drivers, rural communities, and people in emergencies. That's millions of Americans who depend on the format in ways streaming can't touch. The AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act has the support of farm broadcasting organizations and agricultural groups for this reason. In a tornado warning in rural Kansas, you aren’t asking Alexa.

But here’s the tension the legislation’s supporters don’t want to talk about: the drivers most likely to need AM in a crisis are the least likely to be buying the new EVs from which it’s being stripped. And the buyers of those new EVs will never notice it's gone.

What's really being settled here isn't technical standards. It's a gunfight at the AM corral — over whose listeners count, whose emergencies matter, and whether a medium that once defined mass communication deserves a legislative life preserver or a graceful exit.

Momentum is building for the AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act, and it may well pass. But momentum in Congress and momentum in the marketplace are two different things.

KNX’s May numbers will tell us something. June will tell us more. By the time this legislation gets to a floor vote, we may already have our answer — not from a committee hearing, but from a ratings book.

If AM radio goes, FM becomes the afterthought. How much longer can it last once half the dial goes dark?

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Speaking of radio, the new Archer & Feldman podcast drops Monday morning on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Bob Butler (KCBS, SAG-AFTRA) joins us to talk about what the Paramount/WBD merger means for California workers and for journalism. We’re also talking about how much longer radio news can survive. Subscribe to the YouTube channel here.