Jeffrey Eisenach should be Purged from the FCC Transition Team as a Phone Company Lobbyist

[Commentary] Vice President-elect Mike Pence is supposedly cleaning house of lobbyists who are part of the Trump transition team. We would suggest that Jeffrey Eisenach fits the bill.

We already wrote about some of his ties to Verizon and the other phone and cable companies, including Comcast. In a 2014 email, Eisenach encouraged Federal Communications Commission member Michael O’Rielly to use an American Enterprise Institute event to ‘lay out the case against’ network neutrality regulations. Eisenach reinforced this message by writing commentary pieces, using his title as a think tank scholar. AEI is a 501(c) (3) educational organization and it claims it does not take positions on public policy issues. Comparing this quote and the email, one has to realize AEI is not supposed to be lobbying for Verizon and the other phone, wireless and cable companies. It could even be violating their IRS granted non-profit status. Now, it could be that this just shows the coziness of the FCC transition team leader with the FCC staff, but considering that Eisenach’s client, Verizon, benefits from these dealings, this brings up a host of ethical violations, or other acts that need investigation.

[Bruce Kushnick is Executive Director of the New Networks Institute]