The House approved the Removing Our Unsecure Technologies to Ensure Reliability and Security Act (HR-7589) and three other telecom security-focused measures Monday night on voice votes. The other bills were the: Foreign Adversary Communications Transparency Act (HR-820), Countering CCP Drones Act (HR-2864) and Securing Global Telecommunications Act (HR-4741). The House this week was also slated to vote under suspension of the rules on the Future Uses of Technology Upholding Reliable and Enhancing Networks Act (HR-1513) (see 2409060053), but lawmakers didn’t offer the measure for debate Monday night. House Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., hailed House passage of HR-820, HR-2864 and HR-7589, which the panel cleared in March (see 2403200076). “China is America’s greatest adversary and poses significant risk to our national and economic security,” she said in a statement. HR-820, HR-2864 and HR-7589 will “advance American competitiveness and global technological leadership, ensuring that America -- not China -- is setting the rules of the road for the technologies of tomorrow.”

The House plans to vote as soon as Monday night, under suspension of the rules, on the Future Uses of Technology Upholding Reliable and Enhancing Networks Act (HR-1513) and four telecom security-focused measures. Other bills on the House’s suspension docket: the Foreign Adversary Communications Transparency Act (HR-820), Countering Chinese Communist Party Drones Act (HR-2864), Securing Global Telecommunications Act (HR-4741) and Removing Our Unsecure Technologies to Ensure Reliability and Security Act (HR-7589). The House Commerce Committee unanimously advanced HR-820, HR-1513, HR-2864 and HR-7589 in March (see 2403200076). HR-820 would require that the FCC publish a list of communications companies with agency licenses or other authorizations where China and other foreign adversaries’ governments hold at least a 10% ownership stake (see 2210250067). HR-1513 would direct the FCC to establish a 6G task force that provides recommendations about ensuring U.S. leadership in developing that technology’s standards. HR-2864 would add Chinese drone manufacturer Da-Jiang Innovations (DJI) to the FCC’s covered entities list. HR-4741 would require that the State Department develop a strategy promoting the use of secure telecom infrastructure worldwide. HR-7589 would direct the Commerce Department to “specify what transactions involving routers, modems, or devices that combine a modem and a router are prohibited” under a 2019 executive order by then-President Donald Trump that barred transactions involving information and communications technologies that pose an “undue risk of sabotage to or subversion of” U.S.-based communications services (see 1905150066).

CTIA, Incompas, NCTA, the Wireless Infrastructure Association and six other communications industry groups urged House leaders Thursday that they should “prioritize consideration” of the House Commerce Committee-cleared American Broadband Deployment Act (HR-3557) “in the final months of this Congress.” House Commerce last year advanced HR-3557, a package of GOP-led connectivity permitting revamp measures, without Democratic support (see 2305240069). Some local government advocates have since also vocally opposed HR-3557 (see 2311060069). Congress’ bid to achieve the “goal of universal connectivity” via the $65 billion it allocated in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act “will ultimately be limited unless certain barriers are removed today,” the industry groups said in a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. The measure “would go a long way to address these barriers” by mandating “clear and streamlined” rules that will prevent permitting bottlenecks. The groups cited language in HR-3557 that “will codify several deployment streamlining orders and interpretations that the FCC has adopted over the past ten years," including the commission’s 2018 order that removed local barriers to small-cell deployment (see 1803220027). The bill also “takes proactive steps to improve siting on federal lands and reduce unnecessary red tape for applications to deploy or improve communications networks,” the industry groups told Johnson and Jeffries.

The Congressional Research Service predicts the U.S. Supreme Court’s June Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo ruling (see 2406280043) and “uncertainty about the scope of the FCC’s authority and ability to adopt regulations in the public interest” could prompt congressional legislation "to clarify the agency’s statutory authority.” Conversely, lawmakers could also maintain “the status quo and let ambiguities regarding the FCC’s rulemaking authority be resolved by the courts,” CRS said in a Wednesday report. “There are also questions on whether the FCC may alter its rulemaking efforts in response to Loper Bright, as well as how such alterations might affect interest in legislation.” The FCC’s July FCC order that lets schools and libraries obtain E-rate support for off-premises Wi-Fi hot spots and wireless internet services (see 2407180024), April net neutrality rules and a 2023 digital discrimination order “illustrate the types of rules that might be challenged as exceeding FCC authority under Loper Bright or the major questions doctrine,” researchers said. Maurine and Matthew Molak petitioned the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week to review the E-rate Wi-Fi order (see 2408300027). The Molaks, whose 16-year-old son died by suicide after he was cyberbullied, say that ruling would give children and teenagers unsupervised social media access. Numerous FCC rules even before Loper Bright "were being contested by affected parties, including” the 5G Fund and next-generation 911 transition, “in both of which the FCC cites its public interest mandate,” CRS said. Researchers also noted the FCC’s 2022 notice of inquiry about ways to aid nascent in-space servicing, assembly and manufacturing companies (see 2208050023) “has come under scrutiny from interested parties.”

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo urged Congress Friday to reach a legislative deal allowing dynamic spectrum sharing on DOD-controlled bands. Pompeo is a Rivada Networks board member (see 2305230040). Frequencies that have military incumbent systems, most notably the 3.1-3.45 GHz band, have been a stumbling block in lawmakers’ attempts to reach a consensus on a broad spectrum legislative package (see 2408150039). Proposals “for Congress to grant sole control over critical bands to private firms, pushing the Pentagon, and their missions, aside … would be a costly mistake that would put American national security at risk,” Pompeo said in a Fox News opinion piece. “Massive amounts of military equipment, from radar to weapons systems, have already been developed and optimized specifically for the spectrum bands in question, and changing that … would take decades to complete and cost hundreds of billions of dollars.” That “unnecessarily grants our adversaries a victory and makes us less safe.” It also “discourages competition and opens the door to companies like Huawei and ZTE, the Chinese Communist Party’s state-backed spyware peddlers, to gain an even bigger share of global wireless hardware manufacturing.” Congress “needs to step up and find a solution that meets the needs of both consumers and our military, and spectrum sharing could be just such a solution.” Pompeo cited the FCC’s three-tiered model for sharing spectrum on the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band and the more recent CBRS 2.0 framework (see 2406120027) as successful models. “Shared licensing democratizes spectrum access, making it accessible to a broad array of users,” which “is critical to unlocking America’s economic potential,” Pompeo said. “The Biden administration could have moved forward with this shared framework last year, but they missed their opportunity. Predictably, it has shown no desire to tackle this problem, as its National Spectrum Strategy simply calls for more studies. This is not leadership.”

House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone of New Jersey, Communications Subcommittee ranking member Doris Matsui of California and the subpanel’s 10 other Democrats said Wednesday they’re backing the FCC’s proposal that requires disclosures on political ads created with generative AI (see 2407250046). The FCC is facing pushback from congressional Republicans over the AI proposal, as demonstrated during a July House Communications hearing (see 2407090049). NAB and the Motion Picture Association are seeking a 30-day extension for comments on the proceeding in docket 24-211 (see 2408120034). Comments are currently due Sept. 4, replies Sept. 19. “We believe that this action is necessary considering the growing impact of generative AI tools on our electoral process,” the House Communications Democrats said in a letter to FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. “While AI is not new, the speed at which we are witnessing the deployment of generative AI is staggering. During this election season, we have already seen AI deployed to manipulate, confuse and misinform voters.” The Democratic lawmakers pushed back against claims by Republican Federal Election Commission Chairman Sean Cooksey and others that the FEC has sole authority over political reporting requirements and disclaimers (see 2406060051). “Such arguments ignore the relevant statutes and decades of precedent,” the Democrats said: “We also find it worrisome that such a simple, consumer-friendly proposal that imposes minimal burdens has evoked such strong opposition from Republicans -- even well before the full text of the proposal was released to the public” in late July (see 2407250046).

Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, wants a “detailed update” from NTIA on “major administrative delays in the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program that have resulted from unlawful red tape [the agency] imposed.” Cruz in September urged states to return unused BEAD money if they have adequate funding from other federal broadband programs to deploy connectivity in unserved areas (see 2309150069). Cruz is now focusing his ire on NTIA allocating $849 million of the $42.5 billion Congress awarded BEAD in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to administer the program. That “nearly billion-dollar slush fund ... appears to have enabled NTIA to impose excessive administrative burdens and pursue the Biden-Harris administration’s extreme left-wing social policies, without legal authority,” Cruz said Tuesday in a letter to NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson. “NTIA has sought to misuse its BEAD authorities to impose rate regulation, unionized labor requirements, climate change regulations, technology mandates, and other extralegal policies on the States. This has continued despite Congress repeatedly reminding NTIA that Congress gave it no statutory authority to use BEAD for any of these social goals” (see 2304200064). “The hard-earned taxpayer dollars appropriated to BEAD should be spent as Congress authorized -- to bring internet access to all Americans -- not held hostage to central planning edicts or left-wing priorities,” Cruz said. He wants NTIA to give him information by Aug. 27 on how it's spent BEAD administrative funding and its evaluation process for states' BEAD plans. NTIA is “in receipt of the letter and will respond,” a spokesperson emailed. A Cruz news release announcing the letter targeted Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democrats’ presidential nominee, because President Joe Biden put her in charge of shepherding the broadband portion of his infrastructure spending proposal through Congress in 2021 (see 2104290076).

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, should investigate potential political misinformation against Vice President Kamala Harris on X, ranking member Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., wrote the chairman Monday. Nadler cited allegations that Grok, X's AI chatbot, shared inaccurate information about Harris. Grok told users Harris missed ballot deadlines in “nine states and suggested that she was ineligible to appear on the presidential ballot in the 2024 election,” Nadler said. The platform removes misinformation against Republican politicians but doesn't apply the same standard for Democrats, he added. Given Jordan’s “extensive” focus on social media censorship claims, his office should investigate this issue, he said. A spokesperson for Jordan said Monday: “No one is doing more for free speech on the internet than Elon Musk and his platform is working better than ever.” Jordan has led various committee efforts probing alleged social media censorship against conservatives (see 2405010079).

Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, criticized the Department of Transportation Thursday night for seeking to zero federal funding for the Maritime Administration’s Cable Security Fleet program in its FY 2025 appropriations request. Congress allocated $10 million for the program in FY 2024. “Congress created the CSF Program through the” FY 2020 National Defense Authorization Act “to ensure a domestic capability to maintain and repair undersea cables,” Cruz said in a letter to Maritime Administration head Rear Admiral Ann Phillips. He said the program requires the administration to contract with privately owned U.S.-flagged cable vessels in “times of national emergency. The security of undersea cables depends on having access to these ‘trusted’ ships for maintenance and repair of cables, rather than relying on foreign-flagged repair ships sometimes owned by foreign adversaries, which may be recalled to their home countries or otherwise pose risks and reliability concerns during conflict.” The “request to zero out the CSF program is puzzling considering the uptick in threats to undersea cables,” including from China and Russia, Cruz said: “U.S. officials have raised concerns that foreign cable repair ships -- on which we will further rely absent the CSF program -- pose a security threat because underwater cables are vulnerable to tampering. Specifically, other countries could tap undersea data streams, conduct reconnaissance on U.S. military communication links, or steal valuable intellectual property used in cable equipment.”

Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is pressing Republican FCC Commissioners Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington to insist the full commission review requests from restructuring radio group Audacy for expedited foreign-ownership review as part of the purchase of its stock by George Soros-affiliated entities (see 2404230054). In July, Cruz wrote Democratic Commissioners Anna Gomez and Geoffrey Starks, urging that they push for a full FCC vote. “Considering the large number of stations involved, the presence of foreign ownership interests in excess of limits specified in federal law, and the deal’s timing in the final run-up to the Presidential election, I argued that a thorough vetting by the full Commission was both an expected duty of the officeholder and necessary to protect the interests of the American public,” Cruz said Friday in a letter to Simington. Cruz's letter to Carr wasn't available. Gomez and Starks “indicated they were eager to avoid accountability by letting faceless, unelected bureaucrats who were not accountable to the public or the Senate rubber-stamp the deal under the guise of delegated authority.” The Democratic commissioners “appear willing to turn a blind eye to Chairwoman [Jessica] Rosenworcel’s pattern of abusing delegated authority,” Cruz said: “This was seen most starkly in the Commission’s mishandling of” the terminated Standard General/Tegna deal (see 2306010077), “where instead of holding an open and transparent Commission-level vote, [Rosenworcel] violated FCC precedent and quashed the deal through a bureau-level order.” He asked Carr and Simington to respond by Aug. 23 about whether they back a full FCC vote on Audacy.