Millions of Americans are about to lose internet access, and Congress is to blame

The Affordable Connectivity Program is about to run out—and Congress is watching it happen. When the ACP was created in 2021 as part of the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the $14.2 billion Congress allocated was expected to last five years. But demand for the benefit was so high that in January the Federal Communications Commission announced the program would be winding down at the end of April, after just three years. To bridge the gap, lawmakers introduced a bipartisan, bicameral bill that would allocate another $7 billion to the program—enough to last until the end of 2024 and give Congress some time to figure out a longer-term plan. But House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has yet to bring the bill to the floor for a vote, despite bipartisan support for the bill and mounting pressure even from some House Republicans to extend the program. As a result, barring some eleventh-hour change of heart, full funding for the ACP will run out, a lapse that could force millions of low-income people off the internet and could deal a major setback to all the progress that was made in expanding internet access since the pandemic. Now experts worry that the end of the ACP will remove the incentive that ISPs had to build in remote or rural areas because it will reduce the number of potential customers they can serve in those places. “As these providers are looking to build out their networks, they’re going to be more likely to do so if they know that there’s going to be a customer on the other end of the line,” says Drew Garner, director of policy engagement at Benton Institute for Broadband & Society.