BEAD-related construction in Louisiana, Delaware and Nevada should start as soon as Q2, according to state officials, some BEAD subgrantee award winners and BEAD experts. The three states last week received NTIA approval of their final proposals, the first to do so. Unclear is whether other states will get started this year due to questions surrounding the change in administration possibly causing delays, we're told.
Federated Wireless CEO Iyad Tarazi expects relative stability on spectrum issues with the change in administrations, though he noted there are always questions. In a wide-ranging interview with us, he predicted that sharing in some form will be part of the rules for the lower 3 GHz band, one of the top focuses of carriers for exclusive, licensed use. A former Sprint executive, Tarazi became CEO of Federated in 2014.
Incoming President Donald Trump said Friday he has tapped former Special Assistant to the President-Technology, Telecommunications and Cybersecurity Policy Robin Colwell as National Economic Council deputy director. Meanwhile, additional communications industry entities hailed Thursday night and Friday Trump’s choice of Senate Armed Services Committee Republican staffer Olivia Trusty as his intended nominee for the FCC seat that then-Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel planned to vacate Monday (see 2501160077).
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., voiced support Thursday for extending ByteDance’s Jan. 19 deadline to divest TikTok after Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., unsuccessfully attempted to advance his Extend the TikTok Deadline Act (S-103) delay proposal Wednesday night by unanimous consent. S-103 and House companion HR-391 seek a 270-day extension of the divestment deadline (see 2501140075). “We aren’t against TikTok,” Schumer said on the floor Thursday. “We want TikTok to keep going. But we are against a Chinese company that is in cahoots with the Chinese Communist Party owning TikTok.” Schumer said TikTok “as it exists today has too many security risks that cannot be ignored,” but it’s “clear that more time is needed to find an American buyer and not disrupt the lives and livelihoods of millions of Americans, of so many influencers who have built up a good network of followers.” It’s “stunning” that Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, R-Ark., objected to Markey’s bid to move S-103 by UC because “time is running short,” Schumer said: “We will continue to work to find a responsible solution to keeping TikTok going, protect American livelihoods and protect against Chinese Communist Party surveillance. We must and can do all three.”
FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr slammed the FCC’s forthcoming enforcement action in response to the Salt Typhoon cyberattacks, which China's Ministry of State Security allegedly perpetrated. Industry officials note that the disagreement between Carr, who takes the FCC's helm next week, and departing Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel points in part to a long-standing divide between FCC Republicans and Democrats about the agency's role in cybersecurity.
President-elect Donald Trump said Thursday he plans to nominate Senate Armed Services Committee Republican staffer Olivia Trusty to the FCC seat that current Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel will vacate Jan. 20. Multiple former FCC officials and communications sector lobbyists told us they expected Trump would also announce as soon as Thursday that Senate Commerce Committee Republican Telecom Policy Director Arielle Roth is his pick for NTIA administrator. A range of ex-FCC officials and other observers previously named Trusty and Roth as top contenders for the Rosenworcel seat, although some believed Roth’s ties to Senate Commerce Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, made her a slight front-runner (see 2412110046).
The FCC’s bureau-level rejections of four content-based legal challenges against network-owned TV stations Thursday could complicate future agency moves against broadcasters over their reporting but won’t prevent it, attorneys and free speech advocates told us. When he becomes chair next week, Commissioner Brendan Carr could quickly reverse the Media Bureau and Enforcement Bureau decisions rejecting challenges against ABC-, Fox-, NBC- and CBS- owned stations. However, doing so could require the agency to defend upending decades of precedent, broadcaster and public interest attorneys told us. The decisions “draw a bright line at a moment when clarity about government interference with the free press is needed more than ever,” said Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a release Thursday. “The FCC should not be the President’s speech police.”
AT&T’s FirstNet will provide “unmatched network support for federal and local first responders” around the National Mall during Donald Trump's inauguration next week, a spokesperson emailed on Wednesday. “We are pre-positioning several deployable network assets from the dedicated FirstNet fleet around the National Mall and surrounding areas to provide enhanced network coverage for public safety on FirstNet should they need it,” the spokesperson said: “In a capability unique to FirstNet,” AT&T has also “cleared and locked” Band 14 spectrum on cellsites around the National Mall and surrounding areas “meaning first responders have their own ‘VIP lane’ and public safety communications is protected from spectators’ network congestion.”
It is critical that more licensed spectrum becomes available for the wireless industry, Rhonda Johnson, AT&T executive vice president-federal regulatory relations, said Wednesday. “The U.S. has no supply of the licensed spectrum that fuels wireless services, and the FCC has no authority to auction the essential resource,” Johnson wrote in a blog post: “This spectrum drought has allowed other countries, including China, to surpass the U.S. in allocating key portions of spectrum.” Expanding AT&T’s network “requires expanding access to the licensed spectrum that powers it,” she said. AT&T arguably has been the most outspoken national wireless carrier in projecting positive things to come from Donald Trump's incoming administration (see 2412100069). Johnson also stressed the importance of regulators clearing a path for the provider to shutter inefficient copper networks (see 2405210059). “Outdated regulations force U.S. telecom companies to maintain inefficient copper networks, diverting investment from the resilient high-speed internet technologies of the future.”
The FCC denied four challenges against broadcast stations at the bureau level in what outgoing Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said is “a stand on behalf of the First Amendment.” In two orders and two letters, the agency rejected three complaints from the Center for American Rights against stations owned by CBS, ABC and NBC, and a third against a Fox-owned station from the Media and Democracy Project. The Center for American Rights complaints accused NBC of violating the FCC’s equal opportunity rules with a Saturday Night Live appearance by Vice President Kamala Harris, CBS of violating the news distortion rules by editing an interview with Harris, and ABC for its moderation of a presidential debate between Harris and President-Elect Donald Trump. The MAD filing called for the FCC to hold a hearing on Fox’s fitness to hold FCC licenses in the wake of a 2023 Superior Court of Delaware ruling on a motion for summary judgment in Dominion Voting System’s defamation case against Fox over its 2020 election reporting. The CBS and ABC complaints were rejected by the Enforcement Bureau, the Fox and NBC filings by the Media Bureau. “The action we take makes clear two things,” said Rosenworcel in a released statement. “First, the FCC should not be the President’s speech police. Second, the FCC should not be journalism’s censor-in-chief.” Incoming FCC Chair Brendan Carr has indicated support for the CAR filings.