FILE PHOTO: Commissioner of Federal Communications Commission Brendan Carr testifies during an oversight hearing held by the U.S. Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee to examine the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), in Washington, U.S. June 24, 2020. Alex Wong/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr has agreed to testify before the Senate Commerce Committee following Disney's decision to take talk show host Jimmy Kimmel off air temporarily, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Carr agreed to testify after speaking to Senate Commerce Committee Chair Ted Cruz this week, the source, who asked for anonymity because the planned testimony has not yet been made public, said on Wednesday. The date of the hearing has not been set but was expected after November, the source added. Semafor was the first to report on the hearing.

The Senate Commerce Committee has jurisdiction over the FCC and Democrats have pressed Cruz to call Carr to testify.

Carr did not comment. Disney, the White House and an FCC spokesperson did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Cruz sharply criticized Carr days after he threatened the licenses of Disney and local broadcasters who aired Kimmel's show after the FCC chair said: "We can do this the easy way or the hard way."

Carr added: "These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead."

Cruz said the comments were "dangerous as hell."

"I got to say that's right out of 'Goodfellas'," Cruz said, evoking the Martin Scorsese gangster movie. "That's right out of a Mafioso coming into a bar going, 'Nice bar you have here. It would be a shame if something happened to it'."

Kimmel drew fire for remarks he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, prompting a condemnation from Carr who urged local broadcasters to stop airing "Jimmy Kimmel Live" on Disney-owned broadcaster ABC.

Cruz had said that Carr's threats could one day hurt conservative media outlets if employed by a future Democratic administration. "We don't want to see weaponization of government by any administration against any perspective - and that's certainly not what we're doing here," Carr said Tuesday.

On Friday, Sinclair and Nexstar Media Group ended a boycott of the Kimmel show on their 70 ABC-affiliated stations covering nearly a quarter of U.S. households.

(Reporting by David Shepardson in Washington and Ananya Palyekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Diane Craft, Jamie Freed and Lincoln Feast.)