New Hampshire moved closer to opting out of FirstNet and rejecting the AT&T state plan, Gov. Chris Sununu (R) said Monday. Sununu signed an executive order establishing an opt-out review committee to mull regulatory and financial risks in pursuing opt-out. The New Hampshire Statewide Interoperability Executive Committee voted 15-0 to recommend opting out, Sununu said. It “determined from a technical standpoint that an opt-out of FirstNet is far and away our best option,” he said. The review committee “will seek clarification of certain proposed fees, as well as clarification of penalties that may be imposed by FirstNet if an opt-out were to fail,” the governor said. “These fees and penalties appear to be arbitrary and primarily designed to deter states from opting out of FirstNet plans.” Sununu urged key federal officials to assist the state “as we examine the numbers released by FirstNet and to ensure that states are being afforded their right to make their decisions with correct information.” New Hampshire earlier asked Rivada to provide an alternative plan (see 1609070063). A FirstNet spokeswoman said the AT&T plan is best for New Hampshire. "We look forward to continuing our consultation with the state and its public safety community throughout the decision-making process."

FCC Commissioner Mike O'Rielly became perhaps the first Republican FCC member to speak against politics in licensing since President Donald Trump tweeted Wednesday about opposing NBC's "license" (see 1710120028). O'Rielly is "pretty consistent on licensing and would not want politics to influence our decision-making,” he told a conference Friday, according to an aide who was present and TR Daily. “I believe in the independence of the agency.” Trump "is rightfully venting his experiences and disappointment with how the coverage has been occurring regarding his administration. I’ve been surprised how vitriolic" such reports have been, O'Rielly reportedly said. "President [Bill] Clinton got better coverage during the middle of impeachment than President Trump is getting these days.” Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel continued to oppose such Trump tweets (see 1710120019). "It's essential that the FCC in all that it does is careful to abide by the First Amendment when it engages in any policies involving broadcast licenses," she said in a CNN interview Sunday. "History won’t be kind to silence, and I think it’s important for all the commissioners to make clear that they support the First Amendment and that the agency will not revoke a broadcast license simply because the president is dissatisfied with the licensee’s coverage." Commissioner Mignon Clyburn expressed similar hopes about her FCC colleagues on such broadcast licensing (see 1710110075). “Revoking a broadcast license solely on [such] grounds would be inconsistent with the First Amendment," a Clyburn spokesman emailed Monday. "The Commission generally does not intervene in such cases because it would amount to replacing the journalistic judgment of a licensee with our own. The Commissioner is hopeful that her colleagues in the Majority share this view.” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., urged FCC Chairman Ajit Pai Monday to “condemn [Trump’s] attack and reassure our nation and our journalists that you will stand up for them and protect and defend their fundamental freedoms.” Trump’s comments “were alarming in both his disregard of the FCC’s independence and flagrant disrespect for freedom of the press,” Blumenthal said in a letter to Pai. “I ask for your unwavering commitment that you will ensure the First Amendment remains a cornerstone of our democracy and that you will not follow through on this direction from” Trump. Blumenthal similarly asked all five FCC commissioners in a series of tweets Monday to “stand up for our free press and reject” President Donald Trump’s “unacceptable, un-American threats.” The offices of Pai and Commissioner Brendan Carr didn’t comment Monday.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein again cited law enforcement's inability to access users' devices and information due to encryption deployed by technology companies, in Friday remarks prepared for delivery at the Global Cyber Security Summit in London. It was his third such speech in just over a week (see 1710100028), promoting DOJ's idea of "responsible encryption," in which providers help law enforcement get access to information it needs in an investigation vs. "warrant-proof encryption" in which it can't get access to user data. "Competitive forces drive technology companies to resist cooperating with the government," he said in the remarks. The Electronic Frontier Foundation criticized his previous speeches (see 1710110072).

“The time is right” for the FCC to approve an order on ATSC 3.0, said NAB CEO Gordon Smith in a meeting with Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel Tuesday, recounted an ex parte filing posted Thursday in docket 16-142. Rosenworcel, in a Thursday speech, said the FCC needs to go back to the drawing board on the proposed 3.0 transition (see 1710120019 or 1710120057). Smith said the FCC should loosen ownership rules and increase the flexibility of broadcasters to meet deadlines in the post-incentive auction repacking. CTA President Gary Shapiro praised the new standard in a statement Friday (see 1710130056).The FCC should permit flexibility and have a “light regulatory touch” for the simulcasting requirements for broadcasters transitioning to ATSC 3.0, said officials from PBS, the CPB and America’s Public Television Stations in a meeting with an aide to Chairman Ajit Pai Friday and a meeting with Media Bureau staff Wednesday, according to filings in docket 16-142. Many public television stations may be barred by geography from sharing facilities for simulcasting that would allow them to duplicate their current contour, the public TV groups said. Content requirements also should be flexible, since it may not be possible for stations to offer the exact same content on the current standard that they will be offering on 3.0, the filings said. The public TV groups don’t want the transition to cause any changes to carriage rules, they said. “We expect that many of the technical upgrades to multichannel video programming distributors’ facilities that are necessary to carry ATSC 3.0 programming will be driven, in large part, through marketplace negotiations with commercial stations,” the filings said.

The GAO accepted a request from House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., and Senate Communications Subcommittee ranking member Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, to do an independent review of the FCC’s claim that a May distributed denial-of-service attack caused outages to its electronic comment filing system (see 1705080042 and 1708170042), a GAO spokesman said. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai told Pallone, Schatz and other lawmakers a “non-traditional” DDoS attack hit the ECFS but the FCC declined to provide specific details on plans to protect ECFS against future attacks (see 1706280044 and 1707310071). The lawmakers repeatedly have questioned the FCC’s claims and previously sought GAO and FBI probes (see 1705310024 and 1707070039). The probe is “now in the queue,” but the GAO’s investigative work “won’t get underway for several months,” the spokesman said. "The scope won’t be determined until the work starts."

FCC Commissioner Michael O'Rielly welcomed Chairman Ajit Pai's spectrum frontiers plan to issue an order by year's end, and a Pai aide warned of a "potential stumbling block" to 5G auctions. Both spoke to the Americas Spectrum Management Conference Friday. O'Rielly said the agency should auction licensed bands quickly or at least set a schedule. He said millimeter-wave spectrum "of greatest interest to manufacturers and providers" should be prioritized, with industry focused on the 24 and 42 GHz bands. "Considering these bands also makes sense due to the proximity" to already-allocated 28, 37 and 39 GHz bands where providers are conducting trials, he said in remarks. O'Rielly cited benefits of international spectrum harmonization and said the EU and China are among those studying the 24 and 42 GHz bands for 5G use. He said more work is needed on mid-band spectrum for next-generation technologies. He couldn't support proposals for fixed operations at 3.7-4.2 GHz, and labeled as "gibberish" criticisms that proposals to provide industry more certainty contained in a pending draft 3.5 GHz NPRM were "stale ideas." Those ideas ushered in auctions and modern networks that made the U.S. "the leader" in wireless, he said. Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel Wednesday criticized the 3.5 GHz draft as offering "stale ideas" (see 1710120009). Citing unlicensed mid-band opportunities, O'Rielly said it's time to bring the 5.9 GHz proceeding to a close, and also consider whether dedicated short-range communications are needed. If DSRC isn't needed, the FCC could combine the 5.9 and 6 GHz bands to expand unlicensed operations. Surveying Pai's policies, his adviser Rachael Bender hailed "flexible" spectrum use and detailed FCC efforts in low, mid and high bands as part of his "all-of-the-above approach." She said a hurdle to the 5G push is that bidder upfront payments are required by law to be put in an FCC-designated "interest bearing account of a financial institution," but no private entities want to do that for spectrum auctions because of recent regulatory changes on collateralization and capitalization. "So the commission currently has no way to comply with the law or move forward with a large spectrum auction," she said, noting a legislative fix was included in a draft FCC Reauthorization Act cleared by the House Communications Subcommittee Thursday (see 1710110070).

An FCC draft order on the planned Securus sale to SCRS Acquisition and a draft enforcement action were sent to commissioners Oct. 6, according to the agency circulation list updated Friday. The commission and Securus, an inmate calling service (ICS) provider, didn't comment. "I suspect we will now see Chairman [Ajit] Pai move quickly to approve the sale of his former client Securus," said Paul Wright, Human Rights Defense Center executive director, who recently told us he expected FCC action (see 1710060053) after Pai was reconfirmed by the Senate. "It is telling that while he promised to seek a solution to the market failure of high prison and jail phone rates there has been a deafening silence on what he actually plans to do." As the FCC considers "the billion dollar plus sale of Securus, the families of prisoners who actually pay the bills and make those obscene profits possible are still waiting for justice," Wright said: "They are the only group of people Chairman Pai excluded from the stakeholders in his statement on the need for ICS reform.”

Former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler and two other former commissioners joined 18 officials from public interest and civil liberties groups Friday to urge FCC Chairman Ajit Pai to publicly condemn President Donald Trump’s recent tweets and comments in which he threatened to challenge NBC licenses over the network's reporting on his administration's activities. Congressional Democrats condemned Trump’s comments about the licenses as a potential threat to the freedom of the press. Top House Commerce Democrats are asking Pai and other FCC commissioners to “disavow” Trump’s comments during a committee hearing (see 1710110075 and 1710120028). “We’re writing to urge you to uphold the First Amendment and to publicly refuse to entertain any broadcast-license challenges on the basis of the president’s disapproval of a network’s news coverage,” said Wheeler and other advocates in a letter to Pai. “Coming from a president who has repeatedly referred to the news media as the ‘enemy of the American people,’ these tweets continue a disturbing pattern in this administration to undercut vital press freedoms.” The threats “are what you would expect to hear in a dictatorship, not a democracy, and they must be condemned in the strongest possible terms.” Others who signed the letter include former Commissioners Michael Copps and Gloria Tristani, Free Press President Craig Aaron and National Hispanic Media Coalition President Alex Nogales. The FCC didn’t comment. Wheeler separately criticized Pai and Republican commissioners Brendan Carr and Michael O’Rielly in a Brookings Institution blog post for their “silence” on Trump’s tweets. “Normally, they will tweet at the drop of a hat,” Wheeler said. “Have they lost their Twitter handles?” The GOP commissioners’ lack of comment means they “have joined in the president’s strategy to get into the head of every television station news editor and station manager in the country,” Wheeler said. “If, because the FCC failed to make clear that the government can’t bully them, even one broadcaster thinks twice about a story and its effect on their license, then the Constitution has been abridged and the FCC is complicit.”

Premium sports programming could move from broadcast and cable TV to the internet within five years, S&P Global Ratings reported Friday: Internet companies will “eventually gain production experience, develop a more stable streaming platform, and win broadcast contracts from a premium sports league," said analyst Naveen Sarma. NFL's Thursday Night Football TV broadcast contract is the only premium sports contract up for renewal before 2021, said S&P, which doesn’t believe the league will award that package to an internet company when it expires at the end of the 2017-2018 season. Amazon, Facebook, Google and Twitter “could offer substantially more money than the TV networks,” but S&P doesn’t believe the NFL is ready. The report cited Bob Bowman, CEO of MLB Advanced Media, saying its BAMTech streaming platform, viewed by the industry as the most advanced livestreaming platform, can stream high-quality video to fewer than 15 million viewers simultaneously. S&P believes internet companies could solve this technological limitation by 2021, when MLB and NFL Monday Night Football TV broadcast contracts come up for renewal. The latter could be an “inflection point” for internet companies to be considered legitimate competitors for TV sports, said the report. Current Monday Night Football broadcast rights owner ESPN pays a higher per game price than NBC, CBS and Fox do for NFL broadcast contracts, with the largest audience ratings declines of those partners over the past two seasons, S&P said.

The FCC OK’d more long-form applications for 600 MHz licenses bought in the incentive auction, said a public notice Thursday. Approved licensees include Farmers Telephone Cooperative, Omega Wireless and Mach FM. Petitions to deny the applications must be filed by Oct. 23, oppositions Oct. 30, replies Nov. 6.