Senate Homeland Security Investigations Subcommittee ranking member Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., on Monday pressed BlackRock, Nvidia and OpenAI to explain news reports about their previously undisclosed donations to President Donald Trump’s proposed 90,000-square-foot ballroom. Blumenthal previously also questioned Comcast, Google, T-Mobile and seven other tech companies that the White House publicly said donated to the Trump ballroom (see 2510230046). The Trump administration hasn’t disclosed how much each company donated.
House Judiciary Committee Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, launched an investigation Tuesday into the participation of AT&T and Verizon in former Special Counsel Jack Smith's reported surveillance of nine GOP lawmakers during the Biden administration. The FBI is already investigating claims that the agency and Smith’s Arctic Frost team, which probed the Jan. 6 Capitol siege, analyzed phone records of Senate Communications Subcommittee member Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee and several other GOP lawmakers from Jan. 4-7, 2021 (see 2510070045). Blackburn and other affected lawmakers are also seeking information from the telecom companies (see 2510170039).
House Commerce Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., said Monday he has hired Michael Essington, EchoStar's former senior manager of public affairs, as the Communications Subcommittee’s new chief counsel. Essington led EchoStar's lobbying of “Capitol Hill Republicans and the Trump Administration,” House Commerce said. He held a similar role at Dish Network before EchoStar’s 2023 purchase of the company. Essington was also previously general counsel for Senate Commerce Committee member Todd Young, R-Ind., working for him on “commerce, telecom, and media issues,” House Commerce said. Before that, he was an aide to former House Commerce member and Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., and was a lawyer at Husch Blackwell.
Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and Communications Subcommittee ranking member Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., separately told us that during Wednesday's hearing on social media censorship, they plan to again raise FCC Chairman Brendan Carr's actions that critics have said are targeting the media’s free speech rights. Commerce Democrats have been pushing Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, to bring in Carr for a hearing. Cruz seeks to have Carr testify as part of a regular FCC oversight hearing, rather than during a censorship-focused panel (see 2510030062). Several Democratic leaders made Carr’s actions the focus of an unofficial hearing in late September (see 2509290062).
Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, on Tuesday asked FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and Attorney General Pam Bondi to probe California's recent law clarifying that the state's Lifeline program “may provide assistance and services for individuals not lawfully present in the United States” under federal statutes (see 2509170065). The law also prohibits the state's Public Utilities Commission and Lifeline from sharing the immigration status of FCC Lifeline applicants or subscribers with other government entities without a valid subpoena or warrant. California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed the law earlier this month (see 2510080007).
House Assistant Democratic Leader Joe Neguse and Sen. Michael Bennet, both D-Colo., are urging FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to reject Nexstar’s proposed $6.2 billion purchase of Tegna (see 2508190042) because it will violate the current 39% national broadcast-ownership cap and “could have devastating consequences for” their state. Nexstar CEO Perry Sook said in September that he expected the FCC to act on the cap before year-end to allow the Tegna purchase to proceed (see 2509050058).
The American Telemedicine Association (ATA) said Friday that health care providers and patients have “growing concern” about the lapse in Medicare reimbursements of qualified telehealth spending amid the government shutdown, which began Oct. 1. In September, just ahead of that appropriations lapse, the group urged Congress to commit to retroactive reimbursement of telehealth spending following a shutdown (see 2509220058). “In the absence of federal coverage for the Medicare population, an increasing number of health systems and providers are scaling back telehealth services,” ATA Federal Affairs Director Alexis Apple said Friday.
The Senate passed the Foreign Adversary Communications Transparency Act (S-259) on Thursday night by unanimous consent. That measure and the very similar, House-passed HR-906 (see 2504290032) would require the FCC to publish a list of communications companies with FCC licenses or other authorizations in which China or other foreign adversaries’ governments hold at least a 10% ownership stake. Congressional leaders included an earlier version of the measure in a scuttled December 2024 continuing resolution (see 2412180033).
Congressional Black Caucus Chair Yvette Clarke of New York and House Communications Subcommittee member Nanette Barragan of California are leading 33 other House Democrats in opposing FCC Chairman Brendan Carr’s proposal to supersede and suspend its 2024 incarcerated people’s communications services (IPCS) order (see 2506300068). The United Church of Christ, Benton Institute for Broadband & Society and justice reform groups also urged the FCC earlier this week to “reverse course” on Carr’s IPCS draft order (see 2510210047), which the commission is slated to vote on at its Oct. 28 meeting.
Telephone Consumer Protection Act lawyer Eric Troutman has filed as an independent candidate for a U.S. House seat representing parts of Orange County, California, he announced on his TCPAWorld blog Saturday. Democratic Rep. Dave Min is the incumbent.