Biden Broadband Plan Weakened by Lobbying and ‘Bipartisan Compromise’

The Biden administration’s broadband plan has been steadily scaled back by “bipartisan compromise” and telecommunications lobbying. While Congress is finalizing a $65 billion version that contains some excellent improvements, experts say it falls well short of fixing the real problem: broadband monopolization and the high prices that result. Roughly two thousand companies and organizations have been lobbying Congress to impact the infrastructure proposal, telecommunications giants among them. Several components of the original broadband plan, like community broadband networks, were quick casualties of such pressure; still, experts say there are numerous and meaningful aspects of the bill. Andy Schwartzman, Senior Counselor for the Benton Institute for Broadband and Society, pointed to the bill's broader restrictions on “redlining” designed to prevent large internet service providers from refusing to upgrade lower-income and marginalized communities to better broadband. “The digital redlining provision is very significant and may be underappreciated,” Schwartzman said. “The fact that it was among the very last elements of the bill being fought over at the end of last week shows just how important it is.” The entire infrastructure plan could still see significant changes, and while the steady weakening of the broadband component is often framed as “bipartisan compromise,” telecommunications lobbyists don’t appear to be doing much of the compromising.