California’s age-appropriate design law doesn’t violate the First Amendment because it regulates social media data practices, not content, the office of Attorney General Rob Bonta (D) argued Wednesday before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The court’s three-judge panel suggested the First Amendment applies.
Providers of incarcerated people's communications services criticized a draft FCC order proposing a reduction in the cap on rates providers may charge for audio or video communications. Most urged the commission to reconsider barring providers from recovering safety and security costs incurred for providing IPCS. Advocates welcomed the move and urged that the FCC continue examining other ways to increase access to communications services for incarcerated people. Commissioners will consider the item during their open meeting Thursday (see 2406270068). Comments were posted through Monday.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals asked Gray Television and the FCC Wednesday to prepare supplemental briefs on the effects of the U.S. Supreme Court decision overruling Chevron deference (see 2406280043) on Gray’s pending appeal of a $518,000 forfeiture order. Oral argument in the 11th Circuit case was held in May (see 2405150055). The case concerns the FCC’s ruling that Gray violated an FCC rule -- often called Note 11 -- barring stations from using affiliation deals to skirt ownership limits. Gray has argued that before the FCC enforcement action, the rule was used only to bar swaps of station affiliation, while Gray’s 2020 deal involved the outright purchase of a station’s affiliation. The 11th Circuit order directs Gray and the FCC to file supplemental briefs “addressing whether and to what extent” the Supreme Court's Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo ruling “impacts the analysis on the appropriate deference to afford the FCC’s interpretation of Note 11 in this case.” Broadcast attorneys told us the request for supplemental briefs is likely a positive sign for Gray -- at oral argument a three-judge panel appeared split on the FCC’s interpretation of Note 11. Gray and the FCC didn’t comment. The order gives Gray 14 days to file a supplement. Once that is filed, the FCC has 14 days for a response, and after that filing, Gray has an additional seven days for a final supplemental filing.
Equitable broadband speed targets are "wise and worthy," but they must be attainable and nonarbitrary, Disruptive Analysis' Dean Bubley wrote Wednesday on LinkedIn. Arbitrary targets can exclude "perfectly good-enough solutions" that don't meet that threshold, he said. "'Gigabit connectivity' has a nice ring to it, which means almost nobody thinks to ask 'why not 700 Mbps or 1.3 Gbps?' when setting targets for broadband," he said. Broadband targets and metrics often haven't kept up with the development of low earth orbit satellite constellations, high-throughput geostationary satellites, high-performance fixed wireless access, and stratospheric or lower-altitude aerial platforms, he said. As a result, they often don't qualify for recognition, promotion or funding, Bubley wrote. Some governments, like Japan and the U.K., take satellite broadband seriously, he said.
ISPs told the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in two cases overturning the Chevron doctrine means the FCC’s net neutrality order must be stayed pending judicial review (see 2407010036). The FCC said Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and the other case had no implications for its order, which reclassified broadband as a Title II service under the Communications Act.
House Commerce Committee Republicans launched a probe Tuesday of NTIA’s communications with state-level broadband offices related to the $42.5 billion broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program. Long-standing Republican criticisms of BEAD, meanwhile, became a major issue during a House Communications Subcommittee hearing that morning on the FCC’s FY 2025 budget request (see 2407090049). Lawmakers sparred over the propriety of GOP Commissioner Brendan Carr publicly slamming the program.
An attorney for Rochester, New York, is examining the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which overturned a four-decades-old standard on judicial deference to regulatory agency decisions (see 2406280043). In February, U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Wolford for Western New York in Rochester found in favor of Crown Castle, Extenet and Verizon on their consolidated claim that the city violated sections 253 and 332 of the Telecommunications Act in the unlawful manner in which it assessed fees for telecom deployments within its jurisdiction. “My office is presently reviewing the Loper Bright decision to determine its implications for the instant matters, particularly as to this Court’s summary judgment analysis,” city lawyer Patrick Beath's filing said: “Plaintiffs believe that Loper Bright has no impact here. I need additional time to make that assessment and confer with my client.”
Advocates of expanding the use of very-low-power devices without coordination in other parts of the 6 GHz band filed a report at the FCC on a “comprehensive Monte Carlo analysis” of interference risks to broadcast auxiliary service TV pickup (TP). “The large majority (95%) of TP links had no exceedance over 100,000 simulation iterations,” a filing posted Monday in docket 18-295 said: “The risk of harmful interference from VLP devices to TP links was exceedingly small with a 0.0001% average probability of an exceedance across all TP links.” Representatives of Apple, Broadcom, Google, Meta Platforms and Qualcomm met with Office of Engineering and Technology staff to discuss the RKF Engineering Solutions report.
The First Amendment protects social media platforms’ ability to moderate content, the U.S. Supreme Court said Monday, sending the tech industry’s lawsuits against Florida and Texas laws back to the lower courts (see 2402270072). All nine justices agreed on remanding, but Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch disagreed with First Amendment-related aspects of the majority opinion, which Justice Elena Kagan wrote (dockets 22-555 and 22-277).
Industry lawyers continue to assess the potentially seismic implications of Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and the other Chevron case decided last week (see 2406280043). Yet the after-effects are being seen already. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday directed parties in the net neutrality challenge to file not later than July 8 supplemental briefing material addressing the effect of the Chevron decision “on our analysis” of a motion to stay the order (see 2406280060).