The FCC will address "additional measures to combat emerging security challenges of the digital age" during the commissioners' open meeting June 6, said Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a note Wednesday. Commissioners will consider a proposal requiring that ISPs comply with new rules concerning border gateway protocol (BGP) security and a pilot program supporting cybersecurity services for E-rate participants. Also on the agenda is a proposal that would change existing bank rating standards for high-cost programs and updates to the commission's low-power television rules.
House Republicans pushed back during a Friday Communications Subcommittee field hearing in Bakersfield, California, against calls for Congress to allocate stopgap funding to the FCC’s ailing affordable connectivity program and the rollout of NTIA’s $42.5 billion broadband equity, access and deployment program. ACP supporters believe they made progress last week toward securing a path that keeps the program funded in FY 2024 despite proposals attaching funding to the FAA Reauthorization Act (HR-3935) failing in the Senate (see 2405100046).
A new bid by Senate Communications Subcommittee Chairman Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., and other senators to attach stopgap funding for the FCC’s affordable connectivity program and additional money for the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program to the FAA Reauthorization Act (see 2405070083) faces resistance from chamber leaders. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and other leaders are skeptical about including nongermane language in the FAA package. A previous proposal to attach ACP money drew opposition during a Tuesday night “hotline” that Senate leaders ran to gauge lawmakers’ support for amendments in the package.
Top Affordable Connectivity Program Extension Act (HR-6929/S-3565) backers Sens. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, and Peter Welch, D-Vt., said Thursday they plan to press forward with an amendment to the bipartisan 2024 FAA Reauthorization Act that would appropriate $7 billion in stopgap funding for the ailing FCC broadband program (see 2405010055) despite opposition from Senate leaders. ACP stopgap funding advocates used a Senate Communications Subcommittee hearing that day to implore that Congress act while critics raised objections about what they said was a lack of clear information about the program's efficacy.
Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, a lead GOP co-sponsor of the Affordable Connectivity Program Extension Act (HR-6929/S-3565), confirmed Wednesday he will push hard for an amendment to the bipartisan 2024 FAA Reauthorization Act that would appropriate $7 billion in stopgap funding to keep the ailing FCC broadband program running through the end of the fiscal year. The Senate voted 89-10 to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to the FAA bill as a substitute for Securing Growth and Robust Leadership in American Aviation Act (HR-3935).
Most industry groups opposed the FCC's decision restoring net neutrality rules and reclassifying broadband internet access service (BIAS) as a Communications Act Title II service Thursday. Most disagreed with Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel on the order's legal standing, warning it could likely be overturned if a challenge is brought (see 2404250004). The Wireless ISP Association will "carefully review" the order and "determine what legal recourse we should take," Vice President-Policy Louis Peraertz said. Several consumer advocacy groups praised the order.
Affordable Connectivity Program Extension Act (HR-6929/S-3565) lead House sponsor Rep. Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y., told us she's cautiously optimistic ahead of the opening of a discharge petition Thursday to force a floor vote on the measure (H.Res. 1119). HR-6929/S-3565 proposes allocating $7 billion for FY 2024 to the ailing FCC connectivity program. Thursday marks the end of a seven-legislative-day waiting period before Clarke can begin collecting signatures on the petition, which would require backing from at least 218 members before becoming effective (see 2404100075). Republican observers, even those who support giving ACP stopgap money, are skeptical the discharge petition bid will succeed.
Advocates of the FCC’s affordable connectivity program and Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program believe funding for both priorities remains available this year, despite Congress having omitted funding in the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act FY 2024 minibus spending package enacted last week (see 2403210067). Program backers acknowledge funding will be more difficult as the FY24 package was their best opportunity. They also admit appropriations politics will only prove trickier with Capitol Hill hunkering down for the 2024 election campaign.
Advocates of additional federal funding for the FCC’s affordable connectivity program and Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program were closely monitoring congressional negotiations Friday in hopes appropriators would reach a deal addressing both priorities as part of a second tranche of FY 2024 spending bills lawmakers want approved before midnight March 22. Rip-and-replace supporters voiced strong optimism that the next “minibus” package would include $3.08 billion to fully fund that program. ACP backers were, at least privately, growing less hopeful of a deal including their priority.
Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called Wednesday for Congress to substantially rein in the FCC's autonomy in setting USF spending and creating new programs amid a bicameral working group’s examination of a possible universal service revamp (see 2305110066). “Caught in a dilemma of wanting to further expand USF programs but having already maxed out the level of taxation American consumers can reasonably tolerate, the conversation at the FCC and in Congress has focused on expanding the pool of companies and products subject to” the USF contribution factor, which is effectively a “tax on the working class,” Cruz said in a paper. “This approach is anything but fair to American taxpayers: it would hide the problem of excessive USF taxation rather than fix it and ultimately make tax burdens worse by emboldening further unaccountable spending growth.” Instead, he said Congress should “take charge of defining universal service and deciding where USF funds may go.” Cruz proposes making most USF programs subject to congressional appropriations but believes “it may make sense to keep the High-Cost program within the current” funding framework “given ongoing multiyear commitments to providers.” Congress should eliminate “duplicative” USF spending, including combining the Lifeline program with the currently independent affordable connectivity program, given perceptions that the “federal government has too many broadband programs, and a poor record of coordinating them,” Cruz said. He also proposes curbing the FCC’s expansion of E-rate eligibility, citing concerns about permitting schools and libraries to use program support for off-premises Wi-Fi hot spots and wireless internet services (see 2311090028).