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The new chairman of the Federal Communications Commission is heading before Congress for the first time since taking over the agency.

Republican Chairman Ajit Pai will testify on March 8 before the Senate Commerce Committee, joined by FCC Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Michael O'Reilly. While GOP lawmakers are likely to praise Chairman Pai, Democrats will look to put the FCC's new boss on the hot seat. Sure to get attention are Pai's moves to chip away at the Obama administration's landmark net neutrality rules. Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) has been one of his most vocal critics and can be expected to hit Chairman Pai with tough questions.

Democrats are also likely to voice their concerns about the makeup of the FCC. The FCC currently has two vacancies for commissioner and its unclear when President Trump will nominate another Republican and Democrat to fill those slots

The White House said it’s unfair to compare Vice President Pence’s use of a private e-mail address to conduct state business as Indiana governor to Hillary Clinton’s home e-mail server setup. “It was an apples to oranges comparison,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. "He was a governor, not a federal employee, which means the laws are different,” she continued. “He did everything to the letter of the law in Indiana, turned all his emails over unlike Hillary Clinton, at least 30,000 on her private server and classified information was found.”

There are numerous differences between the two situations. Indiana law does not bar public officials from using private email accounts, but they are expected to retain those communications for public records requests. Federal employees, on the other hand, are strongly discouraged from using personal accounts for work purposes. Pence spokesman Marc Lotter said he directed his lawyers “to review all of his communications to ensure that state-related emails are being transferred and properly archived by the state, in accordance with the law.” Clinton deleted almost half of her private email archive, claiming they were personal in nature. But an FBI investigation later turned up thousands of work-related emails that were not turned over to the State Department.

CNN President Jeff Zucker said President Trump is obsessed with his cable news network, spending "his days and nights watching it” despite constantly attacking it in public. "A lot of this is red meat for his base," Zucker said. "He claims that CNN is unwatchable, but the only way he knows that is because he's watching it obsessively. We know that he spends his days and nights watching CNN." CNN has been targeted as “fake news” by Trump more than any other broadcast news outlet.

President Donald Trump's latest attempt to stop the damaging leaks coming from the White House has been leaked to the press. Current and former officials told said that in an effort reduce leaks to the media, the White House has limited access to its classified computer systems.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin also dedicated his first senior staff meeting in Feb to underscoring that he will not tolerate leaks to the media. Trump's administration is increasingly committed to reducing the amount of leaks coming from the White House in recent months. The flurry of leaked documents and reports has undermined Trump's key policy positions, including his ban on immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries. Some officials also told the news agency that they fear a witch hunt is on for a Department of Homeland Security official who leaked the draft intelligence report to the press.

The House Science Committee approved a bill designed to encourage federal agencies to adopt cybersecurity framework developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The committee approved the bill largely along party lines, despite opposition from Democratic Reps to provisions in the bill requiring NIST to evaluate and audit federal agencies’ adoption of the cybersecurity and technology guidelines.

Rep Ralph Abraham (R-LA) introduced the NIST Cybersecurity Framework, Assessment, and Auditing Act of 2017 recently, couching it as a response to recent high-profile cyber breaches like those at the Office of Personnel Management and IRS. The legislation would direct NIST to develop metrics for evaluating federal agencies’ cybersecurity and submit an initial assessment and regular audits to Congress on cybersecurity measures put in place by federal agencies. It would also set up guidance for federal agencies to incorporate the NIST cyber framework and establish working groups in the federal and private sectors to help public and private entities use the framework.

[Commentary] The Trump administration has rightly recognized the importance of advanced communications networks, having included telecommunications in an initial list of critical infrastructure priorities. More than 100 members of Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, also recently joined in urging President Trump to include broadband within any broader infrastructure initiatives. As our policymakers gear up for action, here’s a simple roadmap for ensuring a brighter broadband future for all Americans:

Build on What Has Worked: Leveraging of the existing Universal Service Fund programs could, if done right, provide the most effective path to ensuring greater broadband access at lower costs and also avoid problems of delay and duplication.

Remove Regulatory Barriers: While the challenging business case for ongoing operations may be the greatest barriers to greater rural broadband deployment, regulatory burdens involving permits, pole attachments, franchising requirements, and rights-of-way can increase costs and cause lengthy delays that in some cases postpone promising projects for more than a year. Streamlining or eliminating regulations and addressing other deployment obstacles could help alleviate these burdens.

[Shirley Bloomfield is chief executive officer of NTCA–The Rural Broadband Association. Jonathan Spalter is president and chief executive officer of USTelecom.]

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) asked the Federal Communications Commission for a waiver to unscramble anonymous phone numbers that had been used to call in bomb threats to a New York Jewish Community Center. A wave of anti-Semitic acts, including bomb threats to JCCs and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, has drawn concern in Washington and around the nation. Since the start of 2017, there have been roughly 100 threats to 81 JCCs across the US.

Sen Schumer's letter specifically referred to a series of bomb threats that were made on Feb 27 to 11 JCCs, several of them in or near New York. Sen Schumer called on FCC Chairman Ajit Pai to issue a waiver that would allow law enforcement to trace the anonymous calls. Sen Schumer recalled former Chairman Tom Wheeler granting a waiver to handle a bomb threat problem at a school in Long Island (NY). “The access enabled critical school personnel and law enforcement officials to coordinate with one another in their attempts to quickly respond to swatting calls made to the School District,” Sen Schumer said.

Sen Dick Durbin (DIL) railed against President Donald Trump, blasting the president for his attacks on the news media. “The integrity of the news industry is under an unprecedented attack,” Sen Durbin said at an event put on by National Association of Broadcasters. “These attacks aren’t just coming from outside our border or the Russian government. The attacks are coming from our own government.”

In his speech, the Democratic senator outlined several protections for journalists that he wants Congress to pursue, including preserving federal libel standards and spending more on public media. He also implored President Trump and his Vice President Mike Pence to consider working with Congress to pass a shield law that would protect journalists from revealing their sources. The Illinois senator noted that he was particularly concerned by the president’s remarks in the context of Trump’s tone on Russia. “His near-constant stream of invective towards the media is even more troubling when you consider that President Trump has had only praise for a dictator and former KGB official who ordered a cyber act of war against our nation, Russian President Vladimir Putin,” Durbin told the crowd.

President Donald Trump reportedly said "sometimes it's the reverse" when asked about the wave of recent anti-Semitic incidents across the country. Trump made the comments to a group of state attorneys general on Feb 28. "He just said, 'Sometimes it's the reverse, to make people — or to make others — look bad,' and he used the word 'reverse,' I would say two to three times in his comments," Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said. "He did correctly say at the top that it was reprehensible." Shapiro said Trump would be speaking about the issue during his address to Congress on Feb 28. "I really don't know what he means, or why he said that,” Shapiro said, adding that he hopes the president will clarify the remark.

President Donald Trump blamed former President Barack Obama for protests against him and Republican lawmakers at recent town halls, as well as for leaks from the White House. “I think President Obama’s behind it, because his people are certainly behind it,” Trump said. “And some of the leaks possibly come from that group. You know, some of the leaks, which are really very serious leaks, because they’re very bad in terms of national security, but I also understand that’s politics. And in terms of him being behind things, that’s politics, and it will probably continue.”