Regulatory classification

My mission and the Federal Communications Commission’s top priority is closing the digital divide and maximizing the benefits of broadband for the American people. The FCC is working to achieve that goal with the help of market principles. We want private companies to have the strongest possible business case for raising the capital and hiring the crews to build next-generation networks. Of course, it’s not enough to make sure that all Americans have high-speed Internet access. We also need to preserve the Internet itself as an open platform for innovation and free expression.

While Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh‘s views on network neutrality were not brought up much during his televised confirmation hearings, several senators asked him about the internet protections in follow-up questions that he responded to in writing. Sen Kamala Harris (D-CA) asked Kavanaugh if he would recuse himself from a hypothetical he may preside over in the future surrounding net neutrality and the First Amendment.

A court ruling that limits state regulation of cable company offerings was praised by Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai, who says the ruling supports his contention that the FCC can preempt state-level network neutrality rules. The new court ruling found that Minnesota's state government cannot regulate VoIP phone services offered by Charter and other cable companies because VoIP is an "information service" under federal law.

[The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit reaffirmed in Charter Advanced Services (MN), LLC v. Lange (in the context of Minnesota’s attempt to regulate interconnected VoIP service) that state efforts to regulate information services are preempted by federal law.]

Congressional and state actions to preserve strong net neutrality protections have bipartisan support—while the Federal Communications Commission’s repeal had bipartisan opposition. Put another way, net neutrality is, and has always been, a bipartisan issue, and more Republicans, in particular, should follow suit. Here’s why:

During his second day of Senate confirmation hearings, Judge Brett Kavanaugh defended his dissent in a federal court decision that upheld the Federal Communications Commission's 2015 net neutrality rules. Pressed by Sen Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) why he disagreed with the rest of his colleagues on the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit that the Federal Communications Commission was within its authority to create the rules, Judge Kavanaugh said he was simply following legal precedent and wasn't looking to strip the agency of its power.

Most critiques of the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh, President Donald Trump’s nominee to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court, focus on his positions on a woman’s right to choose, his extreme deference to presidential power, or his views on sensible gun laws.

The Senate formally kicks off the confirmation battle over Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh with lawmakers poised to grill the judge for several days on a host of issues. Key among them for the tech and telecom crowd: Kavanaugh’s dissenting opinion in a 2017 ruling that upheld the Obama-era net neutrality rules.

Network neutrality activists are having a field day with the recent report that Verizon “throttled” the mobile data usage of the Santa Clara County Fire Prevention District (FPD). What really happened wasn’t a net neutrality issue: The FPD simply chose a data plan for their mobile command and control unit that was manifestly inappropriate for their needs. The FPD needed a lot of high-speed 4G mobile data — up to 300 GB/month when the device was deployed.

Sen Ed Markey (D-MA), Rep Anna Eshoo (D-CA), 27 senators, and 76 representatives filed an Amicus Brief with the DC Circuit Court of Appeals challenging the Federal Communication Commission’s December 2017 decision to eliminate network neutrality rules. The FCC’s decision repealed the 2015 Open Internet rules, which categorized broadband internet access as a telecommunications service and prohibited Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from engaging in discriminatory practices, such as blocking or throttling online content and establishing internet fast and slow lanes.