*In partnership with Broadband Breakfast, we occasionally republish each other's content. The following story by Broadband Breakfast Reporter Jake Neenan was originally published here.

The Senate voted Thursday evening to pass its Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization package without an amendment that would have funded the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP).

A bipartisan group of lawmakers had hoped to use the must-pass FAA bill as a vehicle for infusing an extra $6 billion for the imperiled broadband subsidy program, but Senate leadership was successful in keeping non-aviation amendments off the bill.

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Lawmakers had mounted a last-minute effort to negotiate a vote on the amendment, with lead sponsor Sen. Ben Ray Luján, D-New Mexico, marshaling 16 bipartisan cosponsors and highlighting the support of advocates and industry groups alike on Thursday afternoon.

“There is growing bipartisan support to strengthen the Affordable Connectivity Program and keep this critical lifeline alive for more than 55 million Americans. There are now 16 Senators from both sides of the aisle, representing millions of people and diverse states, backing this amendment,” he said in a statement.

The Senate also managed to prevent a lapse in the agency’s authorization by passing a separate short-term extension. The House extended the agency’s remit until May 17 on Wednesday before leaving D.C. for the week, and will still need to vote on Thursday's five-year reauthorization package.

Join us live on Thursday, August 18th, at 3:30pm ET for the latest episode of the Connect This! Show. Co-hosts Christopher Mitchell (ILSR) and Travis Carter (USI Fiber) will be joined by regular guest Kim McKinley (UTOPIA Fiber) and Casey Lide, Partner at Keller and Heckman.

The panel will talk about LTD Broadband and Starlink recently getting removed from the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) by the FCC, the most recent Universal Service Fund report sent to Congress, and whether the new streaming video landscape is materially different from the old cable TV model (and if we should care). 

Subscribe to the show using this feed on YouTube Live or here on Facebook Live, on find it on the Connect This! page.

Email us broadband@muninetworks.org with feedback and ideas for the show.

Watch here on YouTube Live, here on Facebook live, or below.

Join us live on Thursday, August 18th, at 3:30pm ET for the latest episode of the Connect This! Show. Co-hosts Christopher Mitchell (ILSR) and Travis Carter (USI Fiber) will be joined by regular guest Kim McKinley (UTOPIA Fiber) and Casey Lide, Partner at Keller and Heckman.

The panel will talk about LTD Broadband and Starlink recently getting removed from the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) by the FCC, the most recent Universal Service Fund report sent to Congress, and whether the new streaming video landscape is materially different from the old cable TV model (and if we should care). 

Subscribe to the show using this feed on YouTube Live or here on Facebook Live, on find it on the Connect This! page.

Email us broadband@muninetworks.org with feedback and ideas for the show.

Watch here on YouTube Live, here on Facebook live, or below.

For more than a year and a half, the nation’s top telecommunications regulator has been stuck in limbo, thanks to a combination of federal dysfunction and industry lobbying. Now the nomination of popular reformer Gigi Sohn to the FCC is facing a full frontal assault by telecom monopolies dedicated to preventing the agency from standing up to monopoly power.

After an inexplicable nine-month delay, President Biden nominated consumer advocate Gigi Sohn to the FCC late last year. Sohn, Co-Founder and CEO of consumer group Public Knowledge and a former advisor to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, is well versed in media and telecom policy, and broadly popular across both sides of the aisle. 

Yet since her belated nomination, Sohn has been met with a bevy of telecom, media-industry, and politically constructed allegations designed to derail her nomination, ranging from false claims that she’d harm rural America, manufactured allegations that she hates police, and false assertions that she’s looking to censor conservative voices in media. 

All of these efforts serve one function: to ensure the nation’s top telecommunications regulator remains mired in partisan gridlock and a 2-2 commissioner voting split. Without a clear voting majority, the agency can’t embrace reforms that are widely popular with the public, whether that’s restoring the FCC’s consumer protection authority, or restoring recently-discarded media consolidation rules.

The BEAD Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) released by NTIA is packed with guidance and regulations for how tens of billions in new funding with be spent. Reading the rules closely gives us a sense of who they might advantage, at least early on, and the line NTIA is trying to walk in giving the money the most bang for its buck while also heading off abuse. 

On a recent episode of the Connect This! Show, Christopher Mitchell, Travis Carter (USI Internet), Kim McKinley (UTOPIA Fiber), and Doug Dawson (CCG Consulting) tackled what we know, what we don't, and what's likely to happen as states begin to file their letters of intent to participate in the program. Watch the shorts below to see them tackle Congressional intent, supply chain requirements, who we think will apply for these subgrants, and WISPs and overbuilding.

Watch the full episode here.

Subscribe to the show using this feed on YouTube Live or here on Facebook Live, on find it on the Connect This! page.

Email us broadband@muninetworks.org with feedback and ideas for the show.

Gigi Sohn is still up for confirmation by the Senate to complete the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) - an independent agency in the executive branch of the federal government that has been stuck at a 2-2 split of Democrats and Republicans since President Biden took office. The FCC is supposed to operate with five commissioners, with the party of the President in power having 3 seats. 

She was the obvious choice in December of 2020, when it was clear that Joe Biden would take office. With decades of history in telecom and media-related policy as well as a recent stint as Counselor to Tom Wheeler when he was Chair of the FCC, she would be among the most-qualified people to serve on it since I began working in telecom in 2007. And by among, I mean at the top.

I’ve known Gigi for many years and respected her from the first time I saw her in action. She isn’t a political agent trying to figure out the best path to the top. She has strong beliefs, and she’ll tell you what they are in a wonderful Long Island blur of passion. She respects other beliefs and ideas but she isn’t going to pretend she agrees with you when she doesn’t. 

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Maybe my word isn’t that persuasive, because I tend to agree with Sohn on many issues. But a lot of people with far more credibility among conservatives have spoken up on Gigi. So I hadn’t written anything about this because I assumed it would take time but Gigi would get confirmed. Plus, I focus my work outside DC and there is a lot going on that is keeping us busy. 

As Senators involved in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Framework are negotiating over legislative language on how to spend $65 billion aimed at expanding high-speed Internet connectivity in “unserved” and “underserved” parts of the country, a new joint report has been published by Common Cause and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) that details the massive influence Big Telecom has on Congress.

The 21-page report – Broadband Gatekeepers: How ISP Lobbying and Political Influence Shapes the Digital Divide – examines the political spending and lobbying efforts of the nation’s largest Internet Service Providers (ISPs), as well as their trade associations, and connects the dots on how some of the most despised companies in America have helped create the digital divide.

The report begins by noting how “major broadband providers, both telecom and cable, have chosen not to build their networks to areas they deem less profitable and not to upgrade many existing customers left behind by outdated technology. These choices entrench the far too wide digital divide and mean Americans pay some of the highest prices for service. At the same time, the largest ISPs have used their outsized influence in Congress to block any legislation that would undermine their stranglehold over the broadband marketplace. In the 116th Congress alone, these corporations spent an astounding $234 million on lobbying and federal elections.”

That’s an average of more than $320,000 a day, seven days a week, as the report’s authors note.

America’s ‘Most Hated’ Companies Lobby to Maintain Monopoly Power

As the Biden Administration is working with Senate Republicans and Democrats on a proposed infrastructure deal which now includes a $65 billion federal investment to expand broadband access, the details of how that money should be spent and where those investments should be targeted have yet to be decided.

In a new policy brief, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance looks to provide clarity for policy-makers by exploring the real challenges of America’s connectivity crisis. The brief aims to clear up a common misunderstanding of exactly where the digital divide is located.

Digital Divide is Not Urban Vs. Rural, It’s Both

It does so by explaining why high-speed Internet access is not a challenge confined primarily within rural America. A lack of fast, reliable, and affordable broadband is also a major problem in urban and suburban America.

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As the brief details, millions of citizens could subscribe for service right now, if only they could afford it — but they cannot. In fact, most recent municipal broadband systems were built to resolve problems with monopoly excess, not the absence of broadband. Many of the places that appear from the DC as though they have gigabit services actually have unreliable networks that are not getting the job done.

The Case for Prioritizing Local Community Efforts