Remarks of Chairman Pai at CANTO 2018

[Speech] The primary focus of my remarks will be the primary focus of my chairmanship since day one: closing the digital divide in order to make sure everyone can benefit from the Internet revolution. To date, I’ve visited roughly 90 cities in 33 states in the US, driving more than 8,500 road miles
in some hard-working rental cars. What are some of the key lessons from this travel? One is that no matter what you do for a living or where you do it, broadband is critical.  A second key lesson is that the communities that are the hardest to connect are also the places that have the most to gain from next-generation networks. The third takeaway is that the costs of being on the wrong side of the digital divide are high and getting higher. That brings me to the final subject I wanted to highlight: disaster response. We should learn from our experiences and develop best practices so that we’re all better prepared and more effective in responding to future disasters.

We may come from different countries, but we all share common bonds—bonds of geography and, more importantly, bonds of shared values. As your neighbor, I’m calling on all of us to work together to bring digital opportunity to all the people we are honored to serve.