Commerce Committee Approves Wheeler Nomination, Cruz Threatens Hold

Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., told us he hadn’t spoken to Reid about the timing of Wheeler’s nomination vote in the full Senate. “I would think he would want to do it really, really quickly,” he said in an interview at the Capitol. “Republicans could make trouble on the floor, because they may want to pair him with a Republican on the FCC, but we don’t play that game in the committee. If they want to play that game on the floor, that’s between” Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Rockefeller. He hadn’t heard who Republicans had nominated for the seat vacated by Robert McDowell, Rockefeller said.

Cruz said he was “not acting to block this nomination, but I believe the nominee needs to answer the question he has three times declined to do,” in a speech following the committee vote. “And if he continues to refuse to answer that question, I may well support other procedural means to delay this nomination until he answers the very reasonable question that has been posed and is a concern of a substantial number of senators.” Cruz previously warned Wheeler that his views on political ads could be the “one issue that has the potential to derail your nomination,” during Wheeler’s nomination hearing last month (http://youtu.be/v9M5u__BHr0). Cruz then asked Wheeler whether he thought the FCC has the authority to “implement the Disclose Act or has the authority to regulate political speech.” During a closed-door meeting prior to Wheeler’s nomination hearing, Wheeler told Cruz he needed to study the issue more. Cruz said Tuesday Wheeler’s subsequent written response was “insufficient, did not answer the question, dodged the question.”

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, told us he’s not planning to oppose Wheeler’s nomination when it comes to the Senate floor for a vote. Last session, Grassley placed a hold on the nominations of commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Ajit Pai during a year-long row over the FCC’s handling of the LightSquared wireless project (CD April 30 p1). There was a “different reason” for opposing Rosenworcel and Pai’s nominations, Grassley told us. “We were not getting information on LightSquared and we are entitled to information with the constitutional role of oversight. I don’t believe I have anything pending with the FCC right now.”

Thune told us it’s “absolutely” the goal of Senate Republican leadership to pair Wheeler’s nomination with the yet-unnamed Republican FCC nominee. “We are still waiting for the White House. I hope they will send the name up soon, and then we'll get on with it,” he said. “Rockefeller wants to proceed with Wheeler’s [nomination], but normally we would pair those nominations out of the committee. But he’s going to proceed and we'll have the votes and I just hope the Democrats, before they put this one on the floor ... make sure we have a Republican nominee.” Thune said during the markup that the committee’s precedent “suggests that we would be better served by pairing Mr. Wheeler with the anticipated nominee for the Republican vacancy on the FCC -- a nomination we hope to receive from the White House very soon.” Thune noted that in the past, such nominees “have frequently -- almost always -- been paired for committee consideration and the occasional delays in committee action caused by such pairings have been often offset by speedy confirmation by the full Senate.”

The White House did not comment on the open Republican FCC seat, which Capitol Hill and industry officials had said will be Michael O'Rielly, a staffer with Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. Thune recently told us McConnell sent the White House a letter formally recommending his candidate for the FCC weeks ago (CD July 17 p1). Traditionally, the Senate minority leader makes his recommendation to the president, who ultimately makes the nomination.

The committee also approved 13 bills, including the Cybersecurity Act (http://1.usa.gov/19iJL7R). Sponsored by Rockefeller and Thune, S-1353 would authorize the National Institute of Standards and Technology to work with U.S. businesses on an ongoing basis to develop a voluntary set of cybersecurity guidelines and best practices (CD July 12 p6). Rockefeller said the bill “doesn’t do everything we need to do to improve our cybersecurity, but it’s a good start.” NIST has been working with owners and operators of critical infrastructure systems since February to develop a voluntary cybersecurity framework as part of President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity executive order. The bill would also strengthen the government’s cybersecurity research, education and public awareness efforts.

The committee passed the Violent Content Research Act (S-134), a media violence bill by Rockefeller. The legislation would direct the FTC and the FCC to work with the National Academy of Sciences to determine if violent programming and videogames have any harmful effects on children. Rockefeller said “we need to address all components of gun violence if we have a fighting chance at protecting our families and communities.” Rockefeller introduced similar legislation less than a week after the deadly elementary school shooting in Newtown, Conn., but it didn’t advance before the end of the last Congress. The legislation differs slightly from an Obama executive order that directed the Centers for Disease Control to do research into the relationship among videogames, media images and violence (CD Jan 17 p3).

NCTA and MPAA “welcome further academic examination of the reasons behind societal violence,” they said in a joint news release Tuesday. They pledged to be “productive partners in the conversation about culture in America. Our industries have a longstanding commitment to providing parents with the resources, education and tools they need to make appropriate family viewing and entertainment decisions.” Media industry groups, including NCTA and MPAA, earlier this year revived the “TV Boss” public service announcements campaign as part of a broader effort to educate the public about TV parental controls (CD Feb 28 p1).

The committee passed S.Res. 157 expressing the sense of the Senate that phone service must be improved in rural areas and that no entity may unreasonably discriminate against such users in those areas. During a hearing last week, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., who sponsored S.Res. 157 with Sens. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., and Tim Johnson, D-S.D., said “the problems still persist” despite recent FCC enforcement actions related to call completion issues. Earlier this year, commission enforcement officials required Level 3 to pay nearly $1 million and meet call completion benchmarks, in response to an investigation into the company’s completion of long-distance phone calls to rural areas (CD March 13 p3). NTCA CEO Shirley Bloomfield said committee passage of the resolution will elevate the awareness of the call completion issue “to a new level,” in a news release. “What we need now is for the FCC to follow through on this momentum with clear, comprehensive and enforceable actions against those responsible,” she said. “We look forward to working with the commission to achieve that end."

The committee passed the NASA Authorization Act (S-1317) with a manager’s amendment. The committee voted down an amendment offered by Cruz to specify that the agency’s funding levels cannot exceed expenditure levels required by the Budget Control Act of 2011. The measure was struck down in a party-line vote. The Senate version of the NASA Authorization Act puts NASA’s budget for FY 2014 at about $18.1 billion, about $1.3 billion more than a House version that was passed this month in the House Science Committee. The Senate bill, S-1317, proposes $1.8 billion for Earth science, compared to $1.2 billion approved by the House Science Committee. However, the Senate bill proposes more than $200 million less than the House bill’s $1.8 billion for the space launch system (SLS). Many House Science Committee Democrats unsuccessfully pushed for higher funding for SLS in the House version (CD July 19 p9). The Senate bill doesn’t address funding for NASA’s proposed asteroid retrieval mission, which the House bill prohibits.