Sen Kerry urges colleagues not to scrap network neutrality rules

Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) wrote to his Senate colleagues, urging them to oppose a resolution to overturn the Federal Communications Commission's network neutrality rules.

The House passed a resolution to repeal the rules in April, and the Senate resolution, sponsored by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), is expected to come up for a vote next week. The FCC's network neutrality rules prevent Internet service providers from slowing down or speeding up access to websites. Wireless carriers are banned from blocking lawful websites or applications that compete with their services. Sen Kerry argued that if the resolution passes, it "will stifle innovation and discourage investment in the next Google or Amazon." He also said it would endanger other health and environmental regulations. "It will set the precedent that this Congress is prepared to deny independent regulators their ability to execute the law," he wrote. "That would put at risk health rules, environmental protections, worker rights and every other public protection that our agencies enforce that some in Congress do not like." Sen Kerry told his colleagues the network neutrality order has "brought certainty and predictability to the broadband economy and insures that anyone can create a website and deliver a service with the certainty that it will be made available to everyone else on the Internet." He argued that the rules do not regulate the Internet but rather regulate "the behavior of firms owning and operating the gateways to the Internet."