Bye-Bye, Ajit Pai: FCC Boss Will Soon Lose Top Spot

His trademark grin. The giant, oversized coffee mug. The time he ignored the public, killed net neutrality at the request of telecom lobbyists, then gleefully danced with a pizzagater thinking it made him look good. But with a Joe Biden win, Ajit Pai’s controversial tenure as head of the Federal Communications Commission will soon be coming to an end. Traditionally, the party in control of the presidency enjoys a 3-2 majority over the FCC and the chairman spot. With a Biden win, the FCC majority reverts to Democratic control next January. As such, Chairman Pai will lose his top spot at the FCC, and experts say he’s likely to leave the agency altogether. Pai’s tenure was a minefield of controversy. In no small part due to Pai’s repeal of net neutrality, which not only eliminated rules preventing ISPs from behaving anti-competitively, but much of the FCC’s authority to police widely-disliked telecom monopolies at all. Instead, that responsibility fell to the FTC, an agency experts say lacks the authority or resources to hold telecom giants accountable (the entire point of the telecom industry gambit).