Rules for protecting GPS from mobile satellite service (MSS) operations in the L band work and don’t need to be revisited, according to satellite and direct-to-device (D2D) interests. But the GPS world is alarmed about the proliferation of D2D hardware in the band and what that could mean for adjacent-band GPS operations, according to comments posted Friday on Regulations.gov as NTIA solicited input on potential interference to the GPS L1 signal from L-band operations at 1610-1660.5 MHz (see 2412260003).
Telecom and utility companies must engage in early communication and collaboration to ensure efficient and safe broadband deployment, industry leaders said Monday at NARUC's Winter Policy Summit. NARUC Telecom Committee members also voted unanimously to adopt two resolutions on utility demand response communication and on vandalism or theft of communications infrastructure.
An FCC advisory opinion on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act would be “a fool's errand” and should be “DOA,” Commissioner Anna Gomez said Sunday in a thread on X responding to a New York Post report that FCC Chairman Brendan Carr is planning to act on 230 soon. “The FCC should not be in the business of controlling online speech,” Gomez said. “Congress and the courts must quickly step in to stop this unlawful power grab.”
Public broadcasting is facing the “most significant” funding challenge it has seen in 30 years, America's Public Television Stations President Kate Riley said Monday at the APTS 2025 Public Media Summit in Washington. Congressional efforts to defund public media are “predictable threats” but grant-freezing executive orders and the FCC's investigation of NPR and PBS stations are “unpredictable threats,” Riley told the “fly-in” gathering of PBS station managers.
FCC staff on Saturday received the same email that most federal employees did from the Office of Personnel Management, asking them to justify their work, but it was unclear Monday how or if FCC staff would respond. The FCC didn’t comment Monday. The leaders of unions that represent federal employees slammed the email. President Donald Trump said Monday he supports the effort.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told us Monday night that he is unlikely to bring up for floor action this week a Congressional Review Act resolution of disapproval (S.J.Res. 7) to undo the FCC's July 2024 order allowing schools and libraries to use E-rate support for off-premises Wi-Fi hot spots and wireless internet services. Reports circulated Friday that Senate leaders were eyeing floor action as soon as this week on S.J.Res. 7. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz of Texas and 12 other panel Republicans filed the CRA measure in late January.
Oral argument in NAB’s challenge of the FCC’s foreign-sponsored content rules is scheduled for April 7, said a clerk’s order Friday in docket 24-1296 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. NAB has argued that the FCC didn’t give proper notice that the rules would apply to all non-candidate political advertising, while the FCC under former Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said the rules were properly imposed and authorized by Congress. As a commissioner, current Chairman Brendan Carr dissented in part from the rules, also arguing that the agency didn’t give broadcasters enough notice. When a Carr-opposed order from the Rosenworcel administration was the subject of oral argument in the 5th Circuit earlier this month, the FCC declined to defend portions of it (see 2502040061).
SpaceX representatives met staff from all four FCC commissioner offices seeking tweaks to the notice of inquiry on the upper C band, set for a vote Thursday (see 2502060062). “Swiftly establishing a modern sharing framework for the 3.98-4.2 GHz band … will help solidify American leadership in next-generation 6G networks that interweave terrestrial and satellite systems to provide ubiquitous connectivity to consumers,” said a filing posted Friday in docket 25-59. SpaceX said it sought “targeted changes” to the draft: “Accelerating the comment and reply deadlines for the item to 30 and 45 days after publication in the Federal Register, respectively, will provide sufficient time to develop a record while allowing the Commission to expeditiously initiate a rulemaking proceeding for the band.”
Representatives from CTIA, T-Mobile, UScellular and Verizon met with an aide to FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez about the upper C band, closing out a round of meetings with commissioner aides on a notice of inquiry set for a vote Thursday (see 2502200049). “CTIA urges the Commission to advance the NOI and move quickly to a notice of proposed rulemaking to maximize the spectrum opportunity for 5G in the Upper C-Band and provide certainty to market participants on the timeline for auction and for transitioning the band for licensed, full-power terrestrial wireless use,” CTIA said in a filing posted Friday in docket 25-59.
Buu Nygren, president of the Navajo Nation, urged FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to make a tribal priority window part of future FCC auctions of AWS and upper C-band spectrum. “The success of the 2.5 GHz Rural Tribal Priority Window has demonstrated the transformational impact of policies that provide direct spectrum access to Tribal Nations,” said a filing posted Friday in docket 13-185. The 2.5 GHz window, established under Republican Chairman Ajit Pai’s “leadership in 2020, was an unprecedented federal policy that enabled over 300 federally recognized tribes to obtain spectrum in rural areas,” Nygren said. The Institute for Local Self-Reliance asked the FCC to add questions on tribal windows to the C-band notice of inquiry and AWS-3 NPRM before commissioners, both set for votes Thursday (see 2502060062). “One of the great challenges in addressing the lack of modern communications technologies that Tribal Nations and the Commission face together in their joint efforts to address their broadband challenges is the lack of access to spectrum and spectrum licensing opportunities,” said a filing posted Friday. The 2.5 GHz window “dramatically increased the number of Tribal Nations holding spectrum licenses from 18 to at least 319.”