Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, could shift the direction Congress’ USF revamp takes when he becomes the panel’s chairman in January, lawmakers and lobbyists told us. Observers believe his impact on what Congress decides will partially depend on how the U.S. Supreme Court rules when it reviews the FCC appeal of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling in favor of Consumers' Research's challenge of the USF contribution methodology (see 2411220050). A high court ruling upholding the 5th Circuit could shift momentum in favor of Cruz’s proposal that Congress make USF funding part of the appropriations process, officials said.
The FCC Office of Economics and Analytics released on Wednesday its latest lists of providers that have “purchased, rented, leased, or otherwise obtained any covered communications equipment or service” from entities on the FCC’s list of unsecure companies. “Consistent with the Commission’s directive to ‘release to the public a list of providers that have reported covered equipment or services in their networks,’ attached are lists of such providers for the 2022 and 2023 Supply Chain Annual Reports,” OEA said: Many of the providers are “participants in the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program, which supports the removal, replacement, and disposal of communications equipment and services produced or provided” by Huawei and ZTE.
The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau approved the reassigned numbers database administrator's request that subscribers’ unused queries to the reassigned numbers database will be added to the queries purchased with a new subscription. Subscribers have asked that unused queries “roll over to the new subscription ... prior to using 100% of their queries,” said a notice in Wednesday’s Daily Digest. The administrator “recommended this modification as it better meets the needs of subscribers,” the bureau said: “We have reviewed the Administrator’s recommendation and find it reasonable. The proposed change serves the interests of fairness by allowing a subscriber to, within certain parameters, keep the queries it has paid for but not yet used.”
Smith Bagley Inc. (SBI) asked the FCC for prompt action on a petition it filed in September seeking a waiver of revised FCC rules for the Lifeline program. “Several weeks ago, FCC staff advised SBI that it should begin tracking its contract customers and disconnecting service for those not using their devices,” said a filing this week in docket 11-42. “In SBI’s view, disconnecting Tribal citizens living in the most difficult of circumstances is a remedy of last resort,” the carrier said: “Accordingly, while we are following staff’s advice to track our customers and identifying those that do not use their devices within the prescribed period, we are not disconnecting them.” SBI noted that for more than 15 years, thousands of its Tribal Lifeline customers have signed one-year contracts for mobile voice and data service, paying the entirety of the customer’s portion up front. “These households, among the most in need of the federal Lifeline benefit, have relied on this contractual arrangement to receive service,” SBI said.
The FCC Wireline Bureau approved a waiver for Indiana’s Rural Telephone Corp. (RTC) of the FCC’s Rural Digital Opportunity Fund milestone and noncompliance rules to permit it to pay early a portion of the required support recovery for defaulting on eligible census blocks within census block groups (CBGs) in its RDOF-funded service area. “Our grant of this limited waiver serves the public interest because we are able to safeguard the public’s funds by recovering support early for CBGs RTC will not serve pursuant to its RDOF obligations,” said an order posted Wednesday in docket 10-90. The waiver also “enables RTC to come into compliance with its RDOF obligations in its remaining CBGs, allowing RTC to continue receiving support, so that RTC can serve consumers with voice and broadband,” the bureau said.
The FCC’s Wireline Bureau in a public notice Wednesday formally announced a host of Rural Digital Opportunity Fund defaults and said the defaulting companies will face RDOF penalties and, for one of them, possible enforcement action. The defaults -- by Mercury Wireless, PVT Networks, Cable One, Sparklight and Fidelity Cablevision -- were previously announced by the companies in letters to the Wireline Bureau, and encompass census block groups (CBGs) in Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri and New Mexico, the PN said. Mercury's defaults are being referred to the Enforcement Bureau “for further consideration,” the PN said. Mercury is defaulting on 9,082 model-estimated locations in Indiana out of the 13,529 it agreed to serve, and 55,175 of 77,925 locations in Michigan, the PN said. It also defaulted on all 8,398 locations it agreed to serve in Illinois, all 29 locations in Kansas and all 5,023 locations in Missouri. “We expect carriers to live up to their deployment commitments, and those who fail to meet their obligations can jeopardize the opportunity to bring broadband to the promised areas and undermine the integrity of the programs,” said the PN. “Such defaults are particularly regrettable when the carrier waits years after authorization to default, making it difficult to correct the problem and otherwise accommodate the defaulted areas in other deployment programs.” Many funding programs make areas ineligible for broadband deployment funding where a provider is already under an enforceable commitment to serve, the PN said. Formally announcing the defaults and informing other governmental entities “avoids leaving these areas unserved for the duration of the RDOF deployment terms because providers may now have access to alternative funding to serve these areas,” the PN said. “This was a very difficult decision for Mercury to make, as we continually strive to deploy highspeed broadband throughout rural America,” the company said in a letter Monday informing the FCC about some of the Michigan defaults. “Factors outside of the company’s control, including rising costs and competitive encroachment, have rendered deployment to many RDOF CBGs economically unviable and ultimately unachievable,” it added.
Communications Daily is tracking the lawsuits below involving appeals of FCC actions.
A possible shakeup of the federal Universal Service Fund (USF) will be top of mind for state telecom regulators in the year ahead, NARUC Telecom Committee Chair Tim Schram said in an interview earlier this month at the association’s Anaheim meeting. USF is one of several areas of uncertainty in 2025, said three state consumer advocates in a separate interview at the collocated National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates (NASUCA) conference.
The next FCC and Trump administration will place a major focus on deregulation of commercial space activities and streamlining the approvals processes, space policy experts tell us. In addition, some expect long-awaited clarity on what agency oversees novel space missions like in-orbit servicing, assembly and manufacturing, or asteroid mining. Moreover, the experts anticipate increased openness about the use of satellite communications in federal programs fighting the digital divide.
The extent to which the U.S. Supreme Court decides the USF challenge on theoretical rather than practical grounds could have major implications for whether the court issues a decision that overturns the program's funding mechanism. The court said last week it will hear a challenge to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' 9-7 en banc decision, which found the USF contribution factor is a "misbegotten tax.” Consumers' Research challenged the contribution factor in the 5th Circuit and other courts.