Trump FCC Landing Team Adds Roddy, Attorney With Agency, Industry Experience
Atlanta attorney Carolyn Roddy was added to the Trump transition's FCC landing team, according to its landing team roster, which is updated periodically. Roddy, who has FCC and telecom industry experience, is an adjunct professor at Atlanta's John Marshall Law School and a board member of the Georgia Technology Authority, which manages delivery of IT services to state and local government agencies and entities.
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Republican Commissioner Ajit Pai continues to be the presumptive interim FCC chairman at the least, and a strong contender for permanent chairman under incoming President Donald Trump (see 1612160037), industry officials and others tell us. "My own personal opinion is Ajit has an inside track because he's very well liked by conservatives and people around Trump," said Newsmax Media CEO Christopher Ruddy, a Trump supporter and friend. An industry official said Pai is "generally well liked, even by people on the other side of the aisle. ... He's a real Republican, very conservative, thoughtful guy." But various contacts stressed Trump's unpredictability.
Roddy has been an attorney at the FCC, a regional regulatory counsel for Sprint, a counsel for Troutman Sanders in Atlanta, and director of regulatory affairs at the Satellite Industry Association in Washington. At SIA, she lobbied the FCC from 2006 to 2008 on various satellite industry issues such as competition, USF, spectrum, and direct broadcast satellite must-carry duties, according to the search results of her filings (here and here). Roddy and the Trump transition team didn't comment.
One satellite company executive who knows Roddy said she's close to Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., the Trump administration’s nominee for head of Health and Human Services, and did work for Trump. The executive also said her being named to the landing team could put her in good position to be the next International Bureau chief.
Roddy is the fifth member of the Trump FCC landing team, joining American Enterprise Institute scholars Jeffrey Eisenach, Mark Jamison and Roslyn Layton, and Bandwidth.com CEO David Morken (see 1611230014, 1611250022, 1611290022 and 1612290038). The team has held meetings at the FCC (see 1612150061).
The FCC landing team appears to be trying to come up with a plan for reorganizing the commission, said an industry official who's a Republican. "I wouldn’t focus so much on who is on the landing team and whatever it is they're doing," said the person, who said much will depend on who's named FCC chairman. "There really are only three, four, five people in New York who matter." That group includes Trump, his designated chief strategist Steve Bannon and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, followed by Vice President-elect Mike Pence and Reince Priebus, Trump's designated chief of staff, the person said.
Newsmax's Ruddy called Pai a "principled conservative, but also savvy and aggressive -- the type of guy Trump has been picking for top jobs." Ruddy said he has talked to Trump various times since the election, but noted he hadn't discussed the FCC chairmanship choice with him or his aides. Ruddy wrote a blog post Nov. 21 on one call from Trump, and suggested five cornerstones for his presidency, including "media diversity."
Indiana State Sen. Brandt Hershman also continues to be mentioned often as an FCC candidate, though some suggest his chances are better for now as a third commissioner, not chairman.