Level of Government

McKee (KY) is a small town that sits mostly within the Daniel Boone National Forest and is about a one-hour, 20-minute drive from Lexington (KY), the nearest big city.

On September 9, Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel spoke at the Consortium of State School Boards Association about the Learn Without Limits initiative. "Six weeks ago, the FCC voted to modernize the E-Rate program to support Wi-Fi hotspots for loan in libraries—and school libraries—nationwide," she said. "For the student without a connection at home or with housing that is inconsistent, having a teacher loan out a hotspot helps make sure they have a stable way to access to the internet. And keeping that kid connected is about more than one child.

The Biden-Harris Administration’s Internet for All initiative is delivering on its promise to connect everyone in America to affordable, reliable high-speed Internet service by 2030. Since the President took office, more than 2.4 million previously unserved homes and small businesses have been connected to high-speed Internet service. Below are highlights of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s (NTIA) achievements under the Biden-Harris Administration. 

On September 6, 2024, the Federal Communications Commission launched its latest (and 18th overall, if you're scoring at home) inquiry into the state of broadband in the United States.

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau (WCB or Bureau) announced that certain Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) census block groups (CBG) are now eligible for other funding programs.

Kara Frederick, the Heritage Foundation’s director of tech policy, on her sweeping vision for re-imagining how conservatives relate to tech, including low earth orbit satellites (LEOs), Smart Cities, and generative artificial intelligence. She spoke about what the government could be doing but isn't, saying "Having a national data protection framework is also, to me, an extremely common-sense measure.

The recent Georgia school shooting was every parent’s worst nightmare, and one that highlights potential downsides to efforts among states, school districts, and federal lawmakers to ban or restrict access to cellphones in classrooms. The moves to restrict phone use in schools have been driven by concerns about the impact screen time has on children’s mental health and complaints from teachers that cellphones have become a constant distraction in the classroom.

It’s been a heated summer for school cell phone bans. Worried politicians and school districts in several states have been swarming to limit cell phone use during class time. In all, seven states have banned or restricted cellphone use in schools, and fourteen have introduced bills doing the same. Among the bills underway is California’s Phone-Free Schools Act, which cleared the state legislature in August and is expecting the governor’s signature.

The three-year anniversary of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) is fast approaching. Zero households have been connected through the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program, IIJA’s signature $42.5B broadband program that aims to bring universal internet service to all Americans. While all infrastructure programs take years to implement, BEAD’s pace has led to increased congressional scrutiny of the program. Whether or not the BEAD program is off track is a point of contention amongst stakeholders.

How will the elections determine how the stock markets react? Traditional wisdom says internet service providers (ISPs) will do better in policy terms under Republicans than under Democrats as Democrats are more likely to take regulatory action that hurts ISPs. This may have been true in the past, but it’s now wrong, according to NewStreet Research Policy Advisor Blair Levin. “There are discrete issues on which ISPs favor the Republican approach.