House GOP Leadership, Waxman and Other Top Lawmakers Outline Net Neutrality Concerns

Top House Republicans questioned the need for net neutrality rules and especially bashed the prospect of Title II reclassification. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, Republican Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and Conference Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., sent the FCC a letter Wednesday echoing what Senate Republican leadership had said earlier this week. The House leadership letter said reclassification would create intense regulatory uncertainty (http://1.usa.gov/T3cCrp).

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, “will be introducing legislation that would remove the claimed authority for the FCC to take such actions, specifically the Commission’s nebulous Sec. 706 authority,” Cruz said in a statement Wednesday. “Congress, not an unelected commission, should take the lead on modernizing our telecommunications laws.” He lamented the agency’s “latest adventure in ‘net neutrality'” and said the proposal would “subject the Internet to nanny-state regulation from Washington.” A copy of the draft legislation was circulating among industry officials earlier this week. The bill would kill a subsection reference to “price cap regulation” and add “measures that promote competition in the local telecommunications market, or other regulating methods that remove barriers to infrastructure investment.” The bill would also kill a different subsection provision that says “'removing barriers’ and all that follows and inserting ‘pursuing regulatory forbearance,'” according to that draft bill text.

The Cruz bill wouldn’t substantially change the net neutrality landscape in Congress, one Democratic staffer with the Congressional Progressive Caucus told us upon review of the draft text. The text would simply codify the Republican position on net neutrality, much as an anti-net neutrality bill from House Commerce Committee Vice Chairman Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., did earlier this year, the staffer said. Lobbyists have told us for months that net neutrality is a highly partisan issue on Capitol Hill, preventing any legislation on the topic from moving.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus amassed signatures from 36 lawmakers for its letter pressing for Title II reclassification (CD May 14 p4) and planned to send that letter to the agency late Wednesday, the staffer said earlier. The staffer said Capitol Hill offices have been feeling a lot of industry pressure to stay off the letter but that no signatory has pulled off yet. The FCC seems aware of the politically sensitive nature of the issue and more receptive to the caucus’s perspective, the staffer said. Those signers include House Judiciary ranking member John Conyers, D-Mich., Reps. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., and Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif.

The Senate Judiciary Committee announced a net neutrality field hearing, scheduled for the first week of July, in Vermont. “I have heard from hundreds of Vermonters who have expressed concerns about aspects of [FCC] Chairman [Tom] Wheeler’s proposed approach to new net neutrality rules and I share their concerns,” Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said in a statement. “I am still waiting to see the full details of this proposal, but I also believe it is critical to highlight the importance of ensuring that the Internet remains an open marketplace for ideas.”

House Commerce Committee ranking member Henry Waxman, D-Calif., backs Wheeler’s intention to vote on his net neutrality NPRM Thursday. Waxman doesn’t object to the FCC’s “proceeding under section 706 as the preferred basis of authority, as this may generate less opposition from some quarters than proceeding under Title II,” he told Wheeler in a letter Wednesday (http://1.usa.gov/1g6ePfx). “But the FCC should also use its undisputed Title II authority as additional authority,” possibly using “Title II as ‘backstop authority,’ issuing one order under section 706 and a contingent order under Title II, or reclassifying broadband Internet service as a telecommunications service and forbearing the no-blocking and nondiscrimination requirements while the section 706 rules remain in effect.” Waxman commended Wheeler for his latest net neutrality draft rules, which do not legalize the creation of fast and slow Internet lanes, Waxman said, calling that idea “antithetical to the principles of an open Internet.”

Wheeler is doing a “terrific” job, is an “independent thinker," has experience in telecom and is still receiving comments on what to do on net neutrality, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., told reporters at the Capitol Tuesday, not expressing any immediate concerns.

"If Title II reclassification is the most effective way to accomplish this goal, that’s what the FCC should do,” Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., said on the Senate floor Wednesday of the creation of strong net neutrality rules. “Because then [broadband service] would be treated as a common carrier service -- that’s how we treat traditional phone service. That, in fact, is what the Internet has become in the 21st century.” Markey slammed at length the prospect of Internet fast and slow lanes. “Openness is the Internet’s heart,” he said. “Nondiscrimination is its soul.”

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., hosted a Reddit discussion on net neutrality Tuesday. “It’s unlikely that we can implement the rules necessary to preserve an open Internet without reclassification,” Wyden told one Reddit user (http://bit.ly/1iTQ9Gv), urging that online community to demand action from Congress and regulators: “Specifically, you can urge your representatives in Congress not to sign a letter like the one that is currently being led by Representative Gene Green,” a Texas Democrat spearheading a letter in circulation calling for net neutrality rules under Communications Act Section 706 authority, not Title II, Wyden said. “Lack of ISP competition is the core market failure that makes enforceable net neutrality rules necessary,” he said.

Green and 19 House Democrats opposed Title II reclassification, in a letter to the FCC Wednesday. Green had led a similar letter with more than 70 Democratic backers in 2010. Signatories included Reps. John Barrow, D-Ga.; G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C.; and Bobby Rush, D-Ill. “Reclassification of Internet broadband as a common carrier could have adverse consequences on an industry that creates hundreds of thousands of jobs, and is an economic driver for our nation,” Green said in a statement Wednesday.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., collected close to 19,000 comments backing net neutrality through his website and delivered those to the FCC, he said Wednesday. “Whether you run a huge website or a small blog, you should have equal access to Internet users without paying a ransom to providers like Comcast,” Sanders said. Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., also issued a statement backing net neutrality protections. Udall wants to ensure people “are not stuck in an Internet ’slow lane,'” he said in a statement. “But allowing new ’toll lanes’ on the Web could drastically change the Internet as we know it.”

Sens. Dean Heller, R-Nev., and Ron Johnson, R-Wis., released a joint statement saying Congress should take the lead on net neutrality. “For the third time in less than a decade, the FCC is trying to regulate the Internet in some fashion,” they said, blasting the proposal as “misguided” and questioning whether there’s need for regulation at all. Sens. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., Dan Coats, R-Ind., and Deb Fischer, R-Neb., sent a letter to the FCC Wednesday calling for more transparency in what they consider a failed process: “Both the Commission and Congress should have sufficient time to review any proposal on net neutrality prior to further action,” these Republicans said (http://1.usa.gov/1lfAUpF).

Wheeler, meanwhile, tweeted for the first time since February this week, directing remarks at House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif. Eshoo had said last week the FCC should examine reclassification in crafting net neutrality rules (CD May 9 p1). “Yes, @RepAnnaEshoo, Title II is a viable option we're considering,” Wheeler said. “We are listening and welcome continued discussion.” (jhendel@warren-news.com)