David McCabe

The top job on the House Energy and Commerce Committee is likely up for grabs in the next Congress, with Rep Fred Upton (R-MI) reaching his six-year term limit with the gavel. The chairmanship has long been prized because it comes with sweeping jurisdiction over technology, healthcare and energy issues.

Rep Greg Walden (R-OR), who now leads the campaign arm for House Republicans, has his eye on the job. So does Rep John Shimkus (R-IL), who outranks Rep Walden in seniority. Both men have been reaching out to party leaders and members who serve on the Steering Committee, which will be awarding top committee jobs after the elections in November. “I’ve talked to a few members of the Steering Committee to make sure that they understood that I do intend to pursue it,” Rep Walden said. The composition of the Steering Committee will shift somewhat after the November elections. But lawmakers seeking to chair a committee, and their aides, often have a good sense of who the decision-makers will be. Rep Shimkus said that he spent much of September speaking with colleagues who might have a say in who gets the gavel. “Yeah, I think pretty much we talked to everyone we were targeted to talk to,” he said. The Energy and Commerce Committee’s wide jurisdiction makes its work of interest to a range of businesses, from Silicon Valley startups to coal-mining companies in Appalachia.

The Federal Communications Commission pulled a vote on a contentious proposal to open up the market for television set-top boxes from its agenda minutes before the start of its monthly meeting on Sept 29. The delay is a blow to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, who had been pitted against the pay-television industry in a fight over the reforms. “We have made tremendous progress — and we share the goal of creating a more innovative and inexpensive market for these consumer devices,” said Chairman Wheeler and the agency’s other two Democratic commissioners, Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel. “We are still working to resolve the remaining technical and legal issues and we are committed to unlocking the set-top box for consumers across this country.” The item now remains on “circulation,” in the parlance of the agency, meaning it is being weighed by the commissioners.

An industry trade association, NCTA -- The Internet and Television Association, said they were pleased with the FCC’s move. “We are pleased that the FCC has chosen to delay consideration of its set-top box item and hope that additional time will lead to meaningful public review and comment on any newly-crafted proposal under consideration.” Sen Ed Markey (D-MA), a vocal advocate for the reforms, said he was frustrated by the delay. "Today’s vote delay is an unequivocal loss for the tens of millions of Americans across the country who are forced to spend their hard-earned money on overpriced set-top box leases that cost them hundreds of dollars a year," he said. "I am extremely disappointed that the majority of the FCC Commissioners have not yet come to an agreement to provide relief for consumers for these bloated set-top box rental fees and certainty to companies who wish to innovate with new products."

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) blocked a tech bill championed by Sen John Thune (R-SD) because of the stalled re-nomination of Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel on the Federal Communications Commission. Sen Reid cited Rosenworcel's outstanding nomination to a second term on the FCC as he objected to Sen Thune's request to pass the MOBILE NOW Act by unanimous consent.

“I do not apologize to anybody for objecting to this legislation," Sen Reid said. "He can bring it out every other day — I’ll object to it — every other minute, every other hour." Sen Thune's bill aims to free up more of the frequencies that carry signals to mobile devices like smartphones. Sen Thune has previously said he expects the issue to come to a head in the lame duck session after the presidential election in November. Sen Thune lamented that state of play, accusing Democrats of playing partisan politics with a non-controversial piece of legislation. “We had her hearing, we voted her out of the committee,” he said. “Scheduling the floor is not something that I control.” “These two issues have been inexplicably linked, but they need not be."

Sen Charles Schumer (D-NY) joined the chorus of New York officials calling for changes to a key mobile emergency alerts system after bombings in Manhattan and New Jersey. In a letter, Sen Schumer pushed Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler to make it possible for such messages to be longer and include richer content.

“Though this resource has provided great assistance in emergency and terror situations in New York and across the country, much work remains to be done in order to modernize the system and bring it into the 21st century,” Sen Schumer said. “Accordingly, I applaud your efforts to improve the system and I ask you to expedite enhancements, such as extending the character limit to the maximum, allowing the use of multimedia images, and improving locational accuracy, so that citizens can be as informed as possible during times of risk.” His move follows a lobbying effort by New York City officials at the FCC ahead of a commission vote on whether, and how, to upgrade the Wireless Emergency Alerts system. The push follows the decision by authorities in the city to send an alert earlier in Sept telling the public they were looking for bombing supsect Ahmad Khan Rahami.

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Ranking Member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) accused Republicans on the Federal Communications Commission of obstructing an investigation into 2015’s network neutrality debate. Rep Cummings said that commissioners Ajit Pai and Michael O’Rielly have not provided documents as part of an investigation into the process leading up to the net neutrality rules the commission approved last February.

“I am writing to request an explanation for your refusal to provide any documents in response to a request from the Oversight Committee more than a year ago relating to the rulemaking process for the Open Internet Order, which was released publicly on March 12, 2015,” Rep Cummings said in the letter. "Your refusal to cooperate with the Committee’s request is unacceptable, it obstructs our investigation, and it prevents the Committee from having a complete or accurate understanding of the circumstances surrounding this rulemaking," he said. He asked that by Sept 16 the two commissioners lay out the steps they have taken to respond to the committee’s request and to say when their offices will fulfill the request.

39 consumer advocate groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Free Press, said that placing an exemption in looming federal privacy rules for broadband providers that covers data divorced from an individual customer would be ill-advised and illegal. The Federal Communications Commission is in the process of crafting rules that, under a proposal from FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, would make it harder for Internet providers to use their customers' data for most purposes. Privacy and consumer groups said in a Sept 7 letter to Chairman Wheeler that the commission shouldn’t make an exception for data that has been stripped of information that could identify the customer to whom it belongs.

“We urge the Commission to resist some parties’ request for the creation of a special carve-out for ‘de-identified’ customer information,” the groups said. “There is no room in the statute to accommodate that request.” “Even if there were, it would be harmful to consumers to allow ISPs to make an end-run around privacy rules simply by removing certain identifiers from data, while leaving vast swaths of customer details largely intact,” they added. The groups argued that it would be easy to re-connect the data with a user. “It is often trivial to re-identify data that has supposedly been de-identified," they said in the latest salvo in the battle over the rules.

The former top lobbyist for the wireless industry’s major trade association in Washington will continue his work for the group, and some of its members, as a consultant. Lobbying forms filed recently show that Jot Carpenter will lobby for CTIA, the trade group, as well as AT&T and Verizon, the nation’s top two wireless providers. His advocacy is focusing on spectrum provisions in the appropriations process as well as a bill meant to combat spoofing, or the practice of falsifying a caller ID.

Carpenter departed from the trade association in July with the intention of starting his own consulting business. At the time, he said he wanted to continue working on wireless issues. “I’m proud of CTIA’s talented team and the many things we have accomplished together during my time at the Association,” he said in a statement at the time. “From spectrum to tax policy to cybersecurity, the things we have achieved together have benefited the industry and consumers and I have been lucky to be involved in all of those efforts.” “I hope that my new venture will include remaining a part of the wireless industry for many years.” He worked at AT&T as well as other jobs in the private and public sectors before coming to the trade group. When he left, CTIA President Meredith Attwell Baker said the organization was “excited to support his new venture and hope to partner with Jot for years to come.”

Policy battles that have been mounting for months are poised to engulf the Federal Communications Commission in the final months of the Obama Administration. Sept 8 marks the deadline for FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler to say whether he will bring any of three major policy proposals to a vote at the commission’s meeting in September.

Major corporate players have a stake in all three debates. One proposal could give Americans more ways to watch television and, possibly, replace their living room set-top box. A second would crack down on how internet providers use customers’ personal data. And a third has the potential to bring changes to an obscure but valuable market for broadband connections that are used by big business.

Bidding concluded late in the day on Aug 30 in the first round of a historic spectrum sale to wireless providers and other buyers without regulators reaching their target for the sale. The first stage of the Federal Communications Commission’s sale ended without buyers bidding the $88.3 billion needed to hit the price target. The agency will hold another stage of the auction with a lower spectrum clearing target. A bidding pool that includes major wireless carriers like AT&T and Verizon as well as other companies, like Comcast, and individuals bid roughly $22.4 billion in the first round. The high price target points to the auction’s first-of-a-kind design.

The FCC spent part of 2016 buying wireless spectrum, the invisible frequencies that carry signals to mobile devices, from broadcast stations. Now they’re attempting to resell it to wireless carriers and other bidders. The broadcasters were active participants, leading to the high cost bar that the commission needs to clear. The $88.3 billion number also includes some costs associated with the auction. The commission also set the highest possible target before the auction began for the amount of spectrum it would attempt to sell. The trade group representing broadcast stations on Aug 31 hinted that the showing in the first stage of the auction was evidence that the wireless industry's pleas for more spectrum were misleading.

A federal court ruled against a challenge to part of the Federal Communications Commission’s ongoing process of reassigning valuable wireless spectrum to mobile providers. FCC officials are currently running an auction to buy spectrum from broadcasters and sell it wireless providers and other buyers — and repackage the assignment of radio frequencies in the process.

Low-power television (LPTV) services, small regional stations that have a secondary position to full-power broadcasters, were not protected from potential difficulties during that repacking process by the commission. The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia denied a challenge from Mako Communications, an LPTV operator, to the FCC’s decision not to extend those protections to its operations, citing a prohibition on altering their spectrum rights in the law authorizing the repacking. The court said that the FCC’s decision not to offer the protections did not change the rights of LPTV broadcasters, since full-power stations already have priority when it comes to using wireless spectrum. “As a general matter, LPTV stations’ secondary status renders them subject to displacement insofar as they cause interference to primary services,” Judge Sri Srinivasan wrote in the ruling. "Today's court ruling validates the Commission's Incentive Auction design in light of the Spectrum Act’s goals," said an FCC spokesperson. "The Commission values the important role that low-power TV and TV translator stations play in the communities they serve. With that in mind, we have taken — and continue to consider — steps to assist any displaced low power stations to find feasible channels after the close of the auction."