Broadband is Missing from Biden-Harris Equity Fact Sheet

The Biden Administration has released a fact sheet on its efforts to advance equity and opportunity, including educational opportunities for Black people. But neither in that pages-long email to reporters nor in a new executive order from President Biden on further advancing equity is broadband even mentioned in the equity equation. Both goals clearly implicate broadband access, whether it‘s used to start online businesses or to close the homework gap. The administration has succeeded in getting billions of dollars in subsidies for broadband and is trying to get tens of billions more, making a point of how important it is to close the digital diversity divide in part by making broadband more affordable. In the section on “Ensuring Equitable Educational Opportunity in K-12 Schools and Higher Education,“ the fact sheet cites investment in reopening schools for in-person instruction. It makes no mention, though, of the billions in emergency aid the administration is spending and the FCC is administering that could help close the homework gap that over-indexes for low-income rural and urban areas. Under improving health outcomes for Black communities, the administration makes no mention of the millions of dollars the FCC had to stand up quickly to help subsidize remote healthcare.