John Eggerton

Ajit Pai gave his first TV interview as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission to Fox Business Network and said he would investigate indecency complaints against CBS, NBC or anyone else if they were presented to him. Chairman Pai appeared on The Intelligence Report with Trish Regan. Regan cited an F-bomb on Saturday Night Live and Adele's F-bomb on the Grammys and asked if the FCC would be investigating them for "this kind of stuff." "If we are presented with complaints, we are duty bound to enforce the law," he said, "and the law that is on the books today requires that broadcasters keep it clean so to speak." Chairman Pai said he took that FCC obligation seriously. But Chairman Pai did suggest he would be watching what broadcasters say on air, per FCC indecency rules on the books, adding: "[A]s a parent I want to make sure that my kids have a wholesome experience when they are watching programs like that."

Over a dozen Democratic members of the House Commerce Committee have asked Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to reverse his reversal of nine Lifeline broadband subsidy authorizations granted in the waning weeks of his predecessor, Chairman Tom Wheeler.

In a letter to Chairman Pai, they said his halting of the expansion of the program, which provides subsides for basic communications services to lower income residents, unnecessarily pulls the tools to connect out of the hands of the poor in the case of one provider, which is already providing service, and the potential for the other eight--which are not yet providing service--to supply those tools. "The order does not explain how its actions will accomplish those goals," they said. "Furthermore, since the Order raised many novel policy questions regarding the Commission’s current efforts to safeguard the integrity of the Lifeline program, we find it troubling that the Chairman would insist on pursuing the same course he has so often criticized his predecessors for: an improper exercise of the FCC’s delegated authority and a refusal to permit the full Commission from voting on an item that poses new questions of law and policy." They said they were all for making the program more efficient and accountable, but said that need not come at the expense of the consumers who benefit from the Lifeline subsidies.

It took awhile, but the Democratic Senators have chosen the new subcommittee assignments for the Senate Commerce Committee, which oversees communications issues including the Federal Communications Commission.

Returning as Ranking Member of the Senate Communications, Technology, Innovation and the Internet Subcommittee is Sen Brian Schatz (D-HI). Rounding out the committee are Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Ed Markey (D-MA), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Tom Udall (D-NM), Gary Peters (D-MI), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Maggie Hassan (D-NH), and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV). The reason the process took as long as it did was the usual jockeying for position for assignments, plus added seats given Democrats' greater proportion of the Senate due to gains in the election. The communications subcommittee lost two members, Sens Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Joe Manchin (D-WV), but gained four--Sens Duckworth and Baldwin, Hassan, and Cortez Masto. Unlike the House, historically most of the communications issues are handled at the committee level.

President Donald Trump is doubling down on his attacks on the media (except for Fox News) and the intelligence community as the media report on the resignation/firing of Trump's National Security Advisor Michael Flynn over contacts with Russia before the election, with some help with leaks from the latter. It also comes amid some bipartisan support for a continuing Hill investigation into Russian influence on the election.

The President fired off a series of tweets early Feb 15 beginning with: "The fake news media is going crazy with their conspiracy theories and blind hatred. @MSNBC & @CNN are unwatchable. @foxandfriends is great!" That was followed by "This Russian connection non-sense is merely an attempt to cover-up the many mistakes made in Hillary Clinton's losing campaign," and "Information is being illegally given to the failing @nytimes & @washingtonpost by the intelligence community (NSA and FBI?). Just like Russia." Trump then tweeted "The real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by 'intelligence' like candy. Very un-American!"

The Roanoke Valley Broadband Authority, which has opposed a bill to put conditions on municipal broadband buildouts in Virginia, said the latest iteration of the bill—amended Feb. 13 in the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee—is no longer a threat to municipal broadband. The telcom-backed bill—introduced in the Virginia assembly in Jan—would have allowed for municipal buildouts but only if they targeted unserved areas, which it defined as those where the average broadband speed is less than 10 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up. It would also have required an independent study to identify unserved areas before any buildouts and would have put conditions on overbuilding of any existing service at any speed. A municipality would also have had to provide access to rights of way on a first-come, first-serve basis to commercial providers and could not have cross-subsidized its broadband with regulated utility money. The bill was already re-crafted once after the VA governor threatened to veto it.

A hearing is scheduled for Feb 14 in the Missouri State Senate Local Government and Elections Committee on a bill that would put new conditions on municipal broadband buildouts. The telecom-backed bill would require a feasibility study before any local government could expand broadband infrastructure and any such expansion would have to be approved by a majority of voters. The bill would also prevent a municipality from cross-subsidizing their service with other revenues if they offered the service in competition with a private provider, and could not use any funds unless the voters approved them. In addition, any subdivision of a municipality wishing to use the service would have to pay "fair market value" and the service could not get preferential access to rights-of-way. Any private provider or other party providing a competitive service that believes the government is violating any of those provisions can sue. Commercial ISPs have long argued that municipalities should not be able to overbuild them with public funds, and that those overbuilds will leave, and have left, taxpayers holding the bag when and if the projects prove unsustainable.

Municipal broadband backer, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, calls it another attempt by entrenched "monopoly" providers and their lobbyists to protect themselves.

Ohio, Utah and Nevada are the first states to sign off on the merger of broadband providers CenturyLink and Level 3 Communications, according to CenturyLink. The merger is valued at $34 billion including debt. The merger was announced Oct 31, and applications were filed with the FCC and for antitrust review by the Department of Justice in December.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai plans a vote on a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) at the Feb 23 public meeting that would allow broadcasters to start rolling out the new ATSC 3.0 transmission standard on a voluntary basis. The NPRM will also ask a lot of questions about how that should happen and its effect on the marketplace. American Cable Association commended Chairman Pai for issuing the draft and for asking all those questions. One of those is: “whether small, rural, low-power, and NCE broadcasters would face unique circumstances with regard to the voluntary provision of ATSC 3.0 that we should consider in this proceeding," followed by suggestions on how to ease those burdens. ACA says that is appropriate, but that the FCC should also ask the same questions about small pay-TV providers and how to ease their burdens as well.

House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) says there could be a resolution on rolling back the Federal Communications Commission's broadband privacy framework as early as Feb. 13.

"We are talking and working with the Senate on this," she said. "I think using the [Congressional Review Act] to invalidate the rulemaking] is fine. That would be the most expedient way to address the concerns and we are working with the Senate to make sure we can do that." Chairman Blackburn she would try to make sure that there was no privacy gap given that once the FCC reclassified ISPs under Title II common carrier regulations, the FTC was prevented from regulating broadband privacy due to its common carrier exemption. "I would think there would be a way to work through that so you don't have a gap in oversight."

Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Corey Booker (D-NJ) are leading more than a dozen senators (all Dems except independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont) calling on Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to reverse his decision to withdraw Lifeline broadband subsidy authorizations from nine companies.

Chairman Pai said the decision was due to 1) procedural errors, 2) because they were issued in the waning hours of the previous Administration, something Republicans warned against, and 3) because he suggested the FCC needed to hit the pause button on expanding the low-income subsidy program until it got a better process for monitoring for waste, fraud and abuse. The senators -- who also included Al Franken (D-MN), Ed Markey (D-MA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) -- said they were deeply troubled by the action. They said the chairman was undermining the program, making it more difficult for low income residents to afford critical communications services, and appearing to run counter to his pledge in the first days of his chairmanship to make closing the digital divide a priority under his watch. The senators pointed out that the customers of at least one of the nine would have to be disconnected.

Evoking section 706 of the Communications Act, they said that the FCC has an obligation to ensure “consumers in all regions of the country, including low-income consumers” have access to “advanced telecommunications services,” and asked him to reconsider the decision.