States Reckon With Lapse of the Broadband Affordable Connectivity Program

Funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) lapsed in May 2024, ending a monthly subsidy that 23 million households nationwide had been using to afford high-speed internet connections. The program’s lapse means many rural, low-income, and other vulnerable households are losing access to internet connections. The end of ACP is also disrupting states’ plans for implementing several federal programs aimed at increasing the availability and usage of affordable broadband, including the Capital Projects Fund (CPF), Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD), and Digital Equity Act (DEA) programs. Over the past two years, states have developed and released plans for BEAD and DEA that hinged on the continuation of ACP. Now, some state broadband offices and legislatures have begun to explore how they can step in to fill the vacuum and deal with the uncertainty created by the ACP lapse. Although no singular state action can fully replace ACP, policymakers are grappling with the uncertainty that the loss poses to their goals for universal affordable broadband access.