Web Welfare Expired, and the Sky Hasn’t Fallen

The impossible has happened: A welfare program ended. Congress created a web-welfare program on an “emergency” basis during the Covid pandemic, and, in classic Washington form, politicians tried to make it permanent. They rebranded it the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) and gave it billions in extra funding. The ACP paid its last benefits on May 31, and all funding for it has been exhausted. Are millions of people losing internet access? No. We knew that wouldn’t happen, even though ACP supporters were fearmongering that it would. This program, which did not give anyone anything as recently as April 2021, was supposed to be vital. To seal the deal, politicians have recently begun saying the ACP is a necessity. A bipartisan group of legislators are calling for its renewal. Senator J. D. Vance (R-OH) said of internet connectivity, “I think it’s one of those things like food, like medicine, where we’ve got to make sure everybody has access to it.”