Level of Government

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau (WCB), in conjunction with the Office of Economics and Analytics (OEA), authorized Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (Auction 904) support for the winning bids by GigaBeam Networks in West Virginia, and Pear Networks in Vermont. The support will be disbursed in 120 monthly payments from the Universal Service Fund (USF), which will begin at the end of December 2022.

This markup comes at the end of a tremendously productive Congressional session. Over the last two years, we’ve turned some of the biggest legislative solutions into the law of the land thanks to the hard work of Committee members and staff, and it has been the honor of a lifetime to serve as Chairman. The Committee has reported out 76 bills, of which 23 have become law. We passed the most significant climate law in our nation’s history, empowered Medicare to negotiate the cost of lifesaving prescription drugs for seniors, made historic investments to rebuild our nation’s drinking water inf

The House Commerce Committee voted 28-23 along party lines not to recommend a Republican-backed resolution of inquiry to the full House.

The Nebraska Public Service Commission (PSC) approved an order (C-5368) awarding 37 grants totaling $20,351,778.01 from the Nebraska Broadband Bridge Program (NBBP). During the 2022 grant cycle, the PSC received 115 applications for funding through the NBBP.

Recent legislation included big increases in federal funding for the deployment of broadband, which is increasingly critical to daily life, but unavailable in some areas. Our analysis found that thousands more skilled workers will be needed to deploy broadband and 5G funded by recent federal programs. If this work is spread over 10 years, the funding would support about 23,000 additional workers at its peak. A shorter timespan could require even more of them. We found mixed evidence on whether there's a shortage of these workers.

Samuel Levine, director of the Federal Trade Commission's bureau of consumer protection, said the agency won't hesitate to sue companies that play fast and loose with customers' data.

Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH), who will chair the House Judiciary Committee next Congress, gave a hint of what is to come with letters sent to five big tech companies requesting information about conservative material removed from their platforms. In letters sent to large online platforms, Rep Jordan requested the top executives at Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook provide any information they have about contact with President Joe Biden's administration regarding "the moderation, deletion, suppression, restricting, or reduced circulation of content." Rep Jordan and other Rep

Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) introduced the Shielding Children's Retinas from Egregious Exposure on the Net (SCREEN) Act, which would direct the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to issue a rule requiring all commercial pornographic websites to adopt age verification technology to ensure children cannot access pornographic content. Specifically, the SCREEN Act:

Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) introduced the Interstate Obscenity Definition Act to establish a national definition of obscenity that would apply to obscene content transmitted via interstate or foreign communications. Obscenity is not protected under the First Amendment and is prohibited from interstate or foreign transmission. The Supreme Court, however, has struggled to define obscenity, and its current definition under the "Miller Test" runs into serious challenges when applied to the internet. Sen. Lee's bill would define "obscenity" within the Communications Act of 1934.

Technical assistance for broadband expansion in Alabama is the focus of a series of meetings in the state. The Alabama Community Broadband Technical Assistance program kicked off recently and will be offered in each of the state’s 67 counties. The program works to provide technical assistance to municipalities and other public stakeholders in the state who are working to ensure broadband is accessible to everyone.